RavenStar When Realities Collide
by Phluph
Summary: Sequel to 'Rise Of Phoenix'. In BRCM things are perfect for Raven & Starfire now as Phoenix... Too perfect. They need a change and Earth has something very weird going on... Now up to 8 full chapters, MUCH more to come!
1. Chapter 1

**Raven-Star – When Realities Collide**

By Phluph, © 2006-2007

**Authors note**

**Legal:** Though loosely based on the Teen Titans comic book and TV series, this is a wholly original parody and fanart work that contains original characters by me as well as those from Teen Titans. As the original comic books and the television series only loosely correlate with each other and are often downright contradictory, this work continues in the same vein. Don't expect things here to fit with the books or the series cause they won't. DC Comics who own Teen Titans have given _no_ approvals of any sort to this original work.

**Random:** Uh, since this _is_ part-2 in a series I highly recommend that you also read and in fact start, with the 1st in the series, RavenStar - The Rise of Phoenix. If you don't there may be a huge WTF? cause this series is unlike anything else out there on the Net dealing with our favorite couple.

_Ah Love! Could you and I with Him conspire_

_To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,_

_Would we not shatter it to bits – and then_

_Re-mould it to our Hearts Desire!_

_-Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam_

**Prologue**

Trigon, the Multiverse's most ancient evil being had been destroyed by the entity named Phoenix. Also known as the 'Two-who-are-One', Phoenix was an Eternal, part of an ephemeral non-physical race that exists outside of space, time, and the Multiverse itself. She was created from the blending of the two lovers known as Raven and Starfire who had been forever changed by the now extinct Azar according to a plan formulated at the dawn of Time in Earth's Multiverse by the rest of Trigon's own race and another rather enigmatic Eternal (and their new lover) Res'al.

After spending a few millenia – or was it days? ... Phoenix was lately beginning to forget the difference -- with Res'al in her own private realm she had created (complete with Titans Tower which Raven and Starfire had taken with them when they left Earth) and had named Big Rock Candy Mountain or BRCM for short, they had been reminded that Phoenix did not necessarily need to present themselves as a single being. Whenever desired they could again split herselves into their all but separate entities of Raven and Starfire. Still forever joined as one in mind and spirit they could nonetheless once again interact with each other and the physical world as individuals or as Phoenix at will.

Needless to say, after remembering this the two-who-were-one as Phoenix immediately discorporated into themselves once again to relive the joy of sharing each others bodies as well as their minds. At first their thoughts were again only of each other and Res'al left them alone to rediscover what they thought they had given up forever when they merged together and were reborn as Phoenix. More unknown time passed until eventually their minds again turned to Res'al who of course knew their thoughts and promptly rejoined them.

To put it mildly, a great time was had by all and for ages – or was it hours? It did seem to all run together... all was right with their existence.

Too bad the prime bugaboo of being an Eternal was beginning to raise its tedious head again.

**Chapter-1**

**_Strangeness in BRCM_**

Starfire, Raven and Ressie (as of late Res'al had been taking on a positively delicious female avatar form that Star and Raven had worked out for her) had been enjoying themselves in a dark forest glade on the far side of their little realm. To 'keep her warrior edge' as Starfire had put it, she had lately taken to creating simulacrum's of some of the most dangerous creatures they had encountered in their travels through time and space to use for battle practice. Raven added the touch of having them appear at random whenever they were in BRCM and added the rule of no using super-normal (for them) powers when fighting them – only their original powers and skills were to be used. As Ressie/Res'al had no such baseline to work with they had settled on basic athletic skills for her along with flight and taught her all they knew of physical fighting techniques. Luckily she proved a very quick learner.

Ressie had once asked what the point of it was and both Starfire and Raven pointed out that if they were going to interact with the physical races then they needed to stay in practice dealing with conflicts using powers more in line with those races and not those of what many would call a god. Considering that Ressie had always encouraged them to stay in-touch with the physical races she couldn't argue with that logic. Her only concern was their continuing desire to 'Do Good'. She felt that Life has to sort itself out and interference by beings such as they was _not_ a good thing but... as long as they kept at least some sense of mortality when doing it then hopefully things would balance out.

Needless to say, when having their 'practice sessions' and bound by those rules they didn't always win against the creatures that were created. Often at least one of them and occasionally all three ended up getting their avatars shredded and more than once, eaten by some of the creatures. The first time one of them was actually eaten it was Ressie and she had found it a rather fascinating experience. Over the course of several more of these battles both Starfire and Raven each, and once the two together as Phoenix also soon got themselves devoured and agreed it was quite bizarre. However, afterwards they also fought much harder to _not_ get killed or at least not eaten as it was not exactly pleasant.

Today had been one of their better battles with all three finishing mostly unscathed. The last of a pack of Rigelian were-beasts had just been crushed by a boulder thrown by Starfire when she told them she was getting 'The Hunger' as she so quaintly put it. She phased from the glade to the kitchen in Titans Tower and was soon poking around in the refrigerator in for something to eat.

Remembering an earlier time when Starfire had ran off for something to eat, Raven frowned as she watched the bodies scattered about the glade faded back into the quantum mists. "Oh no. I reeeeally hope she goes for pizza" Raven said as she too started to feel a bit peckish.

Starfire wasn't quite sure what she wanted which was fine with her. She enjoyed rummaging through the cold storage box with the 'Blue non-moving Furries' it made sure were always there for her. She was quite proud that when she and Raven together as Phoenix had created this 'scenario' as Res'al had called it, she had insisted that part of the setup was a refrigerator and kitchen that always remain stocked with her and Raven's favorite foods of the moment.

Since becoming an Eternal she and Raven may not need food (or air or water or anything else for that matter) to live, that didn't mean they didn't like to eat and drink just for the enjoyment of it. Res'al however didn't and frankly thought it rather bizarre to create food and drink and then ingest it just to savor it's physical sensations in their very thoroughly anatomically complete avatars until they made it go away again. He put it to their humanoid beginnings and felt it was an odd but harmless habit they'd eventually give up.

Starfire knew that Raven and Res'al were probably enjoying each others company after the battle but Raven would no doubt join her shortly. It was pretty much a given that whenever she or Raven got a craving for something the other eventually would too. "All part of what we've become" she thought to herself. "For now we may be 'ourselves' but still we are one.

Now, what to consume? Hmm, the little frozen checkerboards that become warm and brown? No... Perhaps with the furry little blue berries?" She gave a frown. Usually the refrigerator helped her along with it's idea of what she wanted.

"You are being the most unhelpful" she scolded it. As if to say it was sorry, an immense round and pungent wheel of Blue Furry Something appeared on the shelf in front of her. As its visible tendrils of stench tickled her nose she squealed with delight and seized it. With the wheel held tightly to her chest, almost dancing she closed the door with a happy spin.

"Glorious! I have not had this since I was a child on Tamaran!" She stepped back and gave a small curtsy, "Thank you most wonderful cold box of food." She could swear that the refrigerator slightly blushed in response.

"I do most dearly love this place" she said as she grabbed a large bottle of mustard and after thoroughly drenching the blue and furry wheel of very ripe and living Tamaranian cheese, ravenously tore into it. As she did, on the other side of the Big Rock-Candy Mountains Raven suddenly gagged as her face screwed up into a horrid grimace. She jumped up, began spitting and frantically pawing at her tongue with both hands then let out a disgusted "GLLAAAaaaahhh!" As she struggled to regain her composure she gasped to her startled companion "Oh... my... GOD!!!"

Tears were starting to drip down her cheeks, as her nose began to run she clutched her stomach which gave a loud and prolonged gurgle followed by her letting loose a great rumbling belch. She momentarily caught her breath and cursed "_WHAT_ IN ALL OUR CREATION DID SHE FIND TO EAT?" then started gagging again. "Enough of this crap!" she finally managed to wheeze out as she killed her senses of taste and smell, wiped her eyes and blew the snot from her nose.

Rolling on the grass almost curled in a ball on the grass Ressie was convulsing in silent laughter at the spectacle with tears steaming from her eyes. "**IT'S NOT FUNNY!**" Raven snarled as she fired a searing dark bolt of energy at her. It was harmless to Ressie of course but made Raven's point by leaving a huge patch of burnt grass around her still convulsing companion.

"**STARFIRE!**" she angrily called as she phased over to where her other-half was at, leaving her very amused companion still rolling on the smoldering and blackened ground with a wide grin on her face.

"Whee ha! That was good!" She wiped the tears from her face and gave a sniff. "Woof... I think I'll leave those two alone for a bit though..." Ressie said to herself as she finally stopped laughing as hard. She gave another little chuckle thinking, "I told them it wasn't a good idea to share all their physical senses!" and that started off yet another round of hard laughter as she faded out from their little scenario.

A dark circular portal appeared on the floor near the kitchen counter and a rather miffed Raven rose out of it with eyes blazing. "STARFIRE! _What_ in our world _IS _that foul stuff you're eating!" she yelled. While she could no longer smell it, she saw a green miasma rolling across the top of the table and down onto the floor that was emanating from a huge plate of some hideously blue, furry, and very runny looking block of – something.

A startled Starfire raised her now also blue and fuzzy face from her mawing with a questioning "Mmfff?" from her overstuffed mouth. Raven at first just gaped at her, then sniggered, followed by outright laughing. Her anger vanished as she took in the sight: Starting with the fact that Starfire was naked (they usually were when here) from all appearances she must have been rolling in as well as eating whatever it was she had come up with. The stuff was all over the counter and floor around her. She was almost covered from head to toe in great dripping smears and gobs of the blue – whatever it was – along with almost as much bright yellow stuff.

"Knowing Star, the yellow is probably mustard" Raven thought. As she watched, the blue smears on Starfire, floor, and the counter were forming their own little swirling green fog around her.

Starfire swallowed and now positively beaming, she proudly raised the plate to Raven's face. "Is this not the most wonderful food you have ever seen? It is a special cheese from my tribes area on Tamaran where it was made only once every 3 years! While each tribe has their own version, it is said that ours was the finest. Created from the fermented squeezings of the male Glorfalger, it is aged in great pits dug into the Fellian swamp."Her eyes glazed slightly in fond memory as she gushed "It takes almost the entire three years to properly ripen like this! Still I can remember the wonderful smells as the Northern winds from across the swamp blew into my bedroom when I was a child. _This_ is the reason for my fondness of the Blue Furries in this box of cold!" She dipped her fingers into the blue goo and tried to put some in Raven's mouth. "You simply must try some!"

Raven began to feel her stomach roll again and gently pushed the plate away along with Starfire's hand. "I think I'llll pass on this one" she nervously drawled.

"But Raven! It is a most delicious and special food with living microscopic lifeforms that are most good for you. At the great Festival of Ripeness all the young who have or are coming of age in the local clans from the area during the three years since the last Festival are thrown by their elders into the blue pits naked to swim in this glorious runny food and gather strength from it. It is then collected into great basins where excess fluid is pressed from it with the feet and then hand-formed to make the Wheels of Great Blue Pleasure to be shared by all. The juice collected is used for many great toasting's at the end of the festival." She again pressed the plate of definitely living furry blue goo towards Raven.

That was just too much. Raven's stomach gave a lurch making her turn and double over with a dry-heave. Crestfallen, Starfire felt and saw Raven's discomfort. "I am sorry my love. I forget that the Tamaranian sense of taste is – different – from most other races."

Raven recovered a bit and wisecracked "Different does not even approach it! And it's not just your taste, it's your sense of smell as well" as she wrinkled her nose. Raising an eyebrow she looked at Starfire, "Just what did you do? Try swimming it?"

Starfire looked herself over and brightened a little. "It is to my people much like the catnip to Earth's feline creatures, I could not resist the feel of it upon me again. While there was not enough to swim in there was more than enough to roll in. The juice from it makes the skin tingle and very tough to help resist injury. It brought back some of the few good memories I have of Tamaran. The last time I enjoyed this rarity was just before I was betrayed by my parents and sister." Starfire became quiet after saying that and gave a little sniff.

Now it was Raven's turn to feel guilty. She steeled herself for what was to come and glided over to Starfire. She gave her a powerful hug and as she scraped some of the goo off of Star's face told her "I'm sorry. I know there are many things you love to eat that I think are revolting to even be near but it's part of what makes you so special. Only next time, please do us a favor and warn me to shut down the appropriate senses, okay?" With a slight shudder Raven sloughed a large mass of the stuff out of Starfire's hair. "It's not like you and I need anything to 'help us resist injury'. You know that nothing in or out of existence can ever really hurt us now." With a puzzled look she added "How did the magic fridge come up with that stuff anyway?"

"That is a most good question. I have not thought about Wheels of Great Blue Pleasure since I first left Tamaran. I simply could not decide what I wanted, scolded the cold box, and this appeared upon the shelf. When I thanked it the box blushed."

"Okaaay, somethings not right here. You know that's not how it's supposed to work. What you most likely want is supposed to be inside of it _before_ you open the door. It shouldn't make..." Raven blinked as it occurred just what Starfire had said. "You said the refrigerator _blushed_? We didn't give it personality or any ability to do more than supply food and keep it cold. Where did that come from?"

Starfire raised her arm and touched her lip in thought, as she did the slowly drying goo began to crack. "I do not know. At the time I was so delighted with the Wheel that I did not question it. However now, that it has been said..." A large chunk of the goo fell off her arm to the floor with a wet thud.

Starfire smirked and giggled, "I think it is time to remove this..." Raven caught that Starfire was about to make the blue goo vanish and stopped her. Her now blue fingers were very pleasantly tingling as were her breasts from the goo smeared on them during their hug and a thought came to her: "As long as I can't smell or taste it anymore, I have a better idea." She raised a devilish eyebrow and slyly asked, "Does this stuff make _everything_ it touches feel this – alive."

Starfire's eyes lit up as she picked up on what her other half was thinking. "Oh most indeed it does! While our adolescent males and females swim in it there is much of the orgasm enjoyed by all from it. It is where the 'Pleasure" comes in the name of the cheese!" she bubbled.

That got another raised eyebrow from Raven. "Uhhh huh... Ah, I'mmm not sure if you meant to say it like that or not, but let's see if we can enjoy some of that 'Pleasure' as well..."

Ressie was puzzled. Even by the unusual reckoning of it in BCRM, Phoenix had been out of contact with her for quite some time. She sped a thought towards them and in reply received a dreamy sounding "...It'sss sooooo bluuuuue..." along with a very confused and quite psychedelic collection of mostly blue-tinged images, swirls of other colors, along with _very_ sensual feelings and emotions. The profound intensity and totality of these effects on Phoenix startled Ressie yet carried the hallmarks of being created by Phoenix herselves. Even from this minor contact with their minds, whatever was causing it was beginning to also effect her. This needed looking into...

A bit concerned, Ressie broke the link and projected a piece of herself into their tower. On arriving she found the tower's main room a disaster. It and the adjacent kitchen were totally covered with a furry blue mess as was the entire couch and floor in front of it, even the walls and ceiling were dripping with the stuff. The air was thick with a green mist rising from everything that was covered with the blue goo. "Great googly moogly! _What_ had those two been doing?" she thought. "Eyuck!" At that, without even a conscious thought the furry mess and mist vanished leaving the area once again spotless and with a hint of cloves and mustard in the air.

Having eternity to kill, Ressie wandered around the tower to find her spacey lovebirds. All too shortly, she finally found them floating just above the roof meditating as the Four-legged Beast with Two Heads. Both were motionless. Looking like a Hindu temple tableau Raven had once shared the memory of with her, they were completely covered in the same blue goo she had found inside. Long ago it had dried to a fine light-blue powder now encasing their beautiful forms, each had their head buried in the others crotch with eyes closed and a look of utter bliss on their faces. From the condition of their dusty covering it appeared they had been unmoving in that pose for a very very long time.

Ressie gently touched their minds: "_Err?_" She was rather surprised when even though they were still split as Raven and Starfire, it again was Phoenix who with a mental yawn and stretch replied, "_Mmmm, finally decided to show up did you? You have _no_idea of what you just missed!_" A blurry recap of their experience flashed through Ressie's mind. "_Ah, been enjoying a psychoactive fungus have you?_" As the intertwined two stirred and slowly separated, the blue covering them cracked and began to fall off. They then morphed into Phoenix's single avatar leaving the dried cheese dust heaped in a pile around her.

Stirring the blue pile with a toe Phoenix snapped into mental clarity. "Psychoactive? Hmm. Yes, that would explain much of what this stuff does. Only when joined as Phoenix have we ever felt so close, felt such ecstasy!" Phoenix frowned, "Question is, when Star talked about it why didn't that possibility occur to Raven? I should have known better! "

Ressie was more than a little concerned about that as well. "I think that should be obvious – once Starfire embraced it's effects your link with her carried part of it over to you clouding Raven's judgment. As for Star knowing what it did to you, well, her mind was already out the window. You know, I think you're carrying this 'physical' part of your avatars too far. If simple substances like that fungus can effect you like that..."

"Yes yes, you're right. We need to stay more disconnected. Is that why you always have at least a few other bits of yourself spread around everywhere?" They knew that right now several pieces of Ressie or whatever they called themselves at the moment were wandering around in three galaxies inside their original Multiverse along with a few dozen more bits that were spread throughout the quantum mists in the rest of Eternity.

"I hadn't thought of it that way but yes, it does keep one a lot less focused and whatever its nature, drastically mitigates the effects of an assault on any single avatar. More to the point, even as only one you must always keep your minds at least partly separated from the avatar's!

When she first ate some of that moldy cheese and you had that hilarious fit, what physical aspects did you shut down – I'm willing to bet that it was only taste and smell and you left the rest active, right?" Pointing to the pile, "By all means go ahead and enjoy stuff like that but please keep a part distant and observing, ready to step in if needed."

"_Fit? Please, what was your 'Fit'?"_

"_Ah, something like this..."_ Raven replied. The scene replayed through Phoenix's minds and she began to quiver and chortle. A snort escaped and a trembling wide grin appeared as Raven remembered and Starfire saw it not only from Raven's view but also through Ressie's eyes. "_Oh I am sorry my love but that truly was most humorous! "_

"_Not for me at the time it wasn't! Now, what happened later... that's a different story!"_

"_I know, but I truly did not know of just what the Blue Wheels of Pleasure contained, only that to my people they were a source of great enjoyment."_

"_Ya think?!!! Just how long do your youths swim in that stuff?"_

"_Only a few hours at a time and many times a day over the course of the festival but it is only for those coming of age. Those who are younger are by tradition not permitted any contact with it and those who have already come of age and gone through the ritual generally only smear a band of it upon the forehead along with eating it and drinking its pressed juices."_

"_No wonder your people are so – unusual. That much exposure to such a powerful psychoactive would definitely have permanent effects for expansion of consciousness and who know what else."_

"_!!!"_

"_What?"_

"_Raven, when my sister and I were very young, no more than 6, my sister... We were playing in the swamps near where the pits of blue cheese ferments in our tribes area. None as young as we were are allowed there but, well, Blackfire had said that she had found a great secret in the swamps and wanted to show it to me. I asked what it was and she showed me a thin blue smear of something on her palm and said that it tingled. She pressed it to my forehead. From there I remember very little except wandering through the swamps to where she found it. It was one of the great blue pits she led us to. I think she had me move to the edge of it saying I could better see shapes in the green mists rising from the blue substance. Raven, she pushed me in! Before I passed out I remember her laughing at me, calling me little miss blue frog._

_I do not know how long I was in it or how I was found and saved. I do remember waking up in my bed and hearing our healers talking; They were quite amazed that I was still alive. Many years later I found out that throughout our entire history only a handful of young children survived that much contact with the cheese. Nothing special was ever noted about them and when it was time, all went through the Festival of Ripeness just fine, as did I."_

"_And you think that may have something to do with what we've become? It's quite possible. What happened to Blackfire?"_

"_She was sent to our southern border to work on one of our relatives farms for several years. Now that I think about it, the area were she was sent was the same one that was disputed and I given to the Southern Tribes for._

_That BITCH! I have the strong feeling that it SHE who caused the dispute to begin with! I later found out that while she was there, there were several very odd deaths of youths on both sides of the border."_ Starfire was beginning to fume. "_I am now not so sure that Blackfire's punishment was enough!"_

"_Trust me Star, with at least a few more millenia of oversized pigeons crapping on her and Karras ahead of them, I think it is. What I wonder about is how the blue goo got on your sister's hand and what influence it may have had on her actions. If that stuff is what I think it might be..."_

Ressie noticed the lapse in Phoenix's attention: "Talking to yourself again?"

Phoenix again snapped back to the now, "Hmm? Sorry, we just had a thought. Remember when we were becoming Phoenix and first met you? Starfire had just asked Arella what it was the First One's and the Ancients had done to make Tamaran part of what would become – me? Is it possible that it could have been the introduction of a mind-altering fungus to part of the Tamaranian life-cycle?"

Ressie shot a glancing thought at the dried blue pile and examined the fungal structures. "Odd solution but possible. The fungus _is_ rather unique and when alive somewhat mobile but, why are you asking me? Go back and take a look for yourself to see what they did."

Phoenix smacked herself on the head, phased out and seconds later re-appeared. "Well that answered that. Why didn't we think of that before!"

"Because you were having too much fun?"

This time Phoenix gave a solid wide smile. "That we have been my dear, that we have." The smile then faded and was followed by a rather glum look. "Anyway, yes the Blue Goo is the key. It not only enhances the abilities of the people of Tamaran but also is their means of non-physical ascension.

While the non-physical abilities of the people themselves does not evolve – yet – the goo's does and with each generation of mingling between it and Starfire's people the bond between them grows. When it is complete we expect that the people of Tamaran will in some form become joined to the stuff. When it happens they may follow the path of the Azar and finally break their physical bonds._That's_ going to be interesting to follow.

Even though the goo is not by any means capable of rational thought as even we can conceive, it carries the racial memory of Tamaran and at times can move with purpose like a slime mold. All of the great blue pits on Tamaran are actually linked together through a fine web of tendrils running through the planets crust. For now at least, not until it is joined with a young Tamaranian host does their collective abilities usually assert themselves."

Phoenix gave a little sniff, "Without the goo, Tamaran would be no different than any other humanoid world. Perhaps the name 'Troq' truly is deserved by us." she said sadly.

"So any humanoid would react the same to prolonged exposure to it?"

"Well, no. The goo is keyed to Tamaranian physiology. It asserts its psychoactive effects in others but that is all. It cannot survive in any other host nor induce the bevy of other changes it does to the Tamaranian's."

"Well then Tamaran still sounds pretty special to me."

That brightened up Phoenix. "You're right! You know, the next planet the Ancients tinkered with was Nox. So maybe..."

"Tamaran was the prototype of planetary consciousness with the goo being the repository instead of the entire planet itself. Like I said, sounds pretty special to me."

Ressie was about to say something else when suddenly an immense fireball along with an incredible stench enveloped both her, Phoenix and the entire top of the tower.

10


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter-2**

_The consequences of an Eternals boredom_

In no mood for games both Phoenix and Ressie were not following their rule about abilities. Unhurt but thoroughly scorched and startled the two turned to meet their new foe. Hovering nearby in the sky a gigantic black dragon with flaming red eyes faced them and released another searing and foul-smelling blast at them that began melting the roof of Titans Tower.

Phoenix recognized their adversary at once. "Malchior!" she said in venomous surprise.

Now it was the dragons turn to be startled. It stopped its attack and thundered, "_**How is it you know my name? Who are you and what is that tower doing in this place?"**_

"We know you because we have fought you before – and won," Phoenix called out. With that Phoenix blurred and split into Raven and Starfire.

The dragons head loomed closer and inspected the two then pulled back with a deep laugh and rumbled, "_**Ah, sweet Raven! You've changed I see, as has your friend. What, did you miss my caresses and lessons? Have you have brought me here for more?"**_

"Caress and learn THIS!" Raven and Starfire screamed as both unleashed a monstrous blast of energy that struck the foul dragon vaporizing a tremendous hole through its chest.

Already dead and not knowing it, in utter shock and amazement Malchior twisted its long neck down and around to witness its more than fatal wound and blinked, seeing the golden sky through its body. "_**What.. **__**how...**__**"**_

With a final weak flap of its wings the fiery eyes of the dragon dimmed and it fell from the sky landing in the mustard moat with a tremendous thick splash that launched a massive amount of the spicy bright yellow stuff high into the sky. A huge column of acrid steam rose from where Malchior fell then stopped as it's body returned into the nothingness it had come from.

As gobs of mustard started raining down on them a rather amused Ressie looked at Raven and Starfire, "I take it you three knew each other?"

"You could say that" Raven growled.

"Fine shot, but I think that was a little overkill..."

"If you knew him, you would say it was _not!_" Starfire chimed in. "Raven, what is happening here? How did the dragon escape your cursed book?"

Raven looked up at the sky, the mustard rain was really coming down now. She had thrown up a rain shield over her as had Ressie while Starfire seemed to be quite enjoying it so far. "I'm not sure but we had better find out." She looked up again. Damn! This was now a torrent of the yellow stuff, far more than what had been thrown into the air by Malchior's splash! "What the fuck!" she spat and promptly phased through the roof to her and Starfire's bedroom. Ressie and a dripping yellow Starfire both quickly followed her lead.

Raven cast an evil eye at Starfire."Do you mind?!" Starfire looked down at the aromatic puddle at her feet. "Oops! Sorry," she said as all traces of mustard on her and the floor vanished. "Now to see about that book..." Raven's storage chest slid itself from the corner across the room to right in front of her. She held her hand over it and the chest became suffused with a soft cold blue glow and opened its lid for her.

"The mustard stopped raining."

"Err?" Both Starfire and Raven looked over to Ressie who was looking out the window.

She turned away from the window and gave a strange look at the two of them. "I said the mustard stopped raining. What's more, all traces of it are gone except for the moat."

"Okaaay ... This is getting stranger and stranger." Raven returned her attention to the chest. "First let's see about Malchior" A heavily bound book surrounded by a rippling black aura floated up out of the chest and into her hand." She sent a thought to it and the aura faded away. Taking a deep breath, she opened it.

"NO!!!" she exclaimed. The page that held the curse which bound the ancient and most evil dragon Malchior to it and the book was blank.

"Raven, how can that be?"

"I don't know Star. The wards on the chest and book were intact and undisturbed. There's no way that Malchior could have ever freed himself from it. Something very strange is going on here. First your Blue Wheel of Pleasure appeared in the refrigerator after you, um, scolded it," Raven's stomach rumbled and burbled again at the memory, "and you said the the refrigerator _blushed_ when you thanked it."

"It did. It saw that I was most pleased by what it produced for me and appreciated me thanking it."

"Ah, yeah. Like I started to say before the blue goo did it's little number on us, all the refrigerator is _supposed_ to do is produce treats for us when the munchies hit. It cannot 'blush' because you said something nice to it."

"But it DID! I saw it's color briefly change to a lovely shade of deep pink!"

"After what we've seen since then, I'm sure it did. Then there is this," she held up the book, "the curse holding Malchior vanishes and releases him and finally, that downpour of mustard. Something is very wrong here. Do you have any ideas Ress? You're being pretty quiet over there."

No reply came.

"Ressie?" Raven said as she turned and looked towards her. Ressie still stood by the window giving them the same strange look.

Starfire shot over to in front of Ressie and wildly waved her arms up and down. "Hello! Schlorfager to Ressie! Is not anyone there?!" Starfire then grabbed hold of Ressie's arms and began shaking her. Ressie! Res'al! Are you in there?" She turned her head and called out, "Raven! I fear the strangeness has now taken hold of Ressie!"

A bemused look came across the the face of their companion as she was shaken by Starfire like a terrier with a rabbit. "Sssstttaarrrr... I'mmmm jjjjuuussssttt ffffiiiiinnnnne" she rattled out. Startled, Starfire stopped shaking her.

"Sooo then... what's with the look" Raven questioned.

Ressie giggled. "You two don't get it do you?"

"It is YOU who is responsible for this?" Starfire hotly said. Now now face-to-face she tightened her grip and her hands glowed with brilliant green energy as she continued "You think that this is one of your 'amusements'? I say that this is _NOT_ a very..."

Ressie held up her hands as best she could, "Whoa there! Down girl, down!" she got out before Starfire really got on a roll. She phased her arms through Starfire's grip and continued, "No, _I_ am not the one causing this. Or should I say, 'the ones'."

"Ones?" Raven and Starfire said at the same time.

"Yes, 'ones'. As in you two. More precisely, the two of you combined with the rather special abilities you've given this little realm of yours." Starfire and Raven just blinked and stared at her. "Oh come on girls! Think! For quite a while now you've stayed only here. When was the last time you two wandered the mists of Eternity or dim-hopped? No idea? Then I'll tell you – by outside reckoning, literally ages. 36,666 Earth years to be exact."

"That long?" Raven asked. "Yes, that long" Ressie shot back.

"But we have been having the most pleasant of times here!"

"Star, that may be quite true but didn't you recently add 'battle practice' to the diversions here? And Raven, when they are desired you arraigned for the simulacrum's to show up at random times. Why?"

"Toooo make it more interesting" she slowly replied.

Starfire's eyes opened wide "And this place we made to keep us entertained, to respond to our desires and adapt to out needs!"

"Sooo..." Ressie was moving her hand in a circular 'come-on, come-on' motion.

Raven and Starfire looked at each other and back at Ressie. Raven spoke first: "So you're saying that we're... Bored?" Starfire picked up and finished the thought: "And this place sensed that we were in need of something different and changed itself to surprise us! We wanted something different and this place obliged by acting different and creating for us things that we did not intentionally desire!"

Ressie touched her finger to her nose which promptly lit up and flashed bright red a few times. "Bingo! - and yes _I_ did the nose. Nice touch?"

Raven looked thoughtful for a moment, "I'd say, more unexpected than nice. That brings up an interesting point though..."

"Yes," Starfire chimed in. "Why has there not been any, um – unusual events yet linked somehow to you. For me so far it was the cheese and the box of cold food."

"And the mustard rain I'm willing to bet" Raven took over. By now she had floated over and joined Starfire standing by Ressie near the window. "For me it was also the cheese – the effects of that stuff is..." her violet eyes became soft and misted over, "incredible." She took Starfires hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. "We definitely will give that a try again sometime." That got a deep blush from Starfire. "Out of curiosity, how long were we under the influence of that stuff?"

"From the time you left to find what Starfire was eating until I found you two was almost 20 years – quite a trip I'd say."

"20 years! Yes, I'd definitely say that was aimed at me as well as Star. Then there was Malchoir, but like Starfire just said – nothing directed at you. Why?

"Good question" Ressie answered. "My best guess is that it's because this place was created by you and is specifically attuned to you. You made it as a place to be sheltered and nurtured and that implies staying occupied and entertained. Add to that the fact that like I said before, you two haven't left here for quite some time whereas I haven't spent near as much here."

"But you have been with us the entire time! Starfire protested.

"Well, yes and no." Ressie tapped a finger to her head. "You forget that wherever I am, I'm not all there. More of me is in other... What?"

She gave Starfire and Raven a very puzzled look as both of them had their hands over their mouths and were beginning to chortle and snigger. Unable to contain themselves they broke down and began laughing hysterically.

A thoroughly confused Ressie repeated "_WHAT?!_" All she got back was a jumble between guffaws.

They looked at her and tried to talk but the two could only get out a word or two before again collapsing in laughter. "Mmfff ... Head... (wheeze, snort)" Raven said tapping her head which set off Starfire, "Yeep... not all..." (chortle, sniff)" then Star did the same and Raven would look at Ressie and again lose it, "Pfffftttt!... not all there!..." This went of for several minutes with Raven and Starfire both leaning on each other to hold themselves up.

Now rather annoyed Ressie rather hotly asked once again "WHAT... IS... SO... FUNNY?"

Finally, still trying to hold each other up Starfire and Raven flowed together into Phoenix once again and calmed themselves enough to coherently answer. "Oh my! (sniff) That was just too much. Definitely evens the score with you from earlier in the glade! Woof.

Ah ha... (chuckle), we're sooooo sorry! (snigger) But you tapping you head and saying that 'you're not all there' is the understatement of all time and _knowing_ you as we do puts that phrase's meaning on many different levels.

"But I'm NOT all here!" Ressie objected. That almost got another round out of the now combined Raven and Starfire but Phoenix was able to contain it to just a broad smirk and a few chuckles. "I think you should know that both Earth and Tamaran use that same turn of phrase to describe one's mental state."

"Well so am I. You know full well that my mind is in many different places right now!"

"That's... not what we mean. No, we mean a 'normal', physical, single persons mental state. That phrase is along the lines of others like 'scatter-brained', or 'one brick short of a hod' or 'swimming with the Flinngles". In other words – loony." Phoenix cocked her head a little, "You know, actually, all those terms do seem to fit you..."

Ressie glowered at her. "My _point_ was that unlike you, I've never made this place my only focal point of consciousness. Because I am never _only_ here I don't think it felt any need to, um, 'entertain' me."

"I suppose that makes sense. You're pretty sure about this ? We mean, you've seen this before right? ... or are you just winging it?"

"Yes I'm _very_ sure of this, no I've never seen this before and yes, I'm winging it. Rather brilliantly I might add."

"And being so modest about it as well."

That earned Phoenix another dark look from Ressie. "I keep telling you that while this place is quite nice, you can't stay just here – or really, anywhere – for so long. Our kind being around anywhere in realspace makes Things start to happen that are not intended. That this place is of your own creation just makes it potentially more chaotic and from what we've seen so far, it has one helluva lot of potential to become even more unpredictable. Question is, what are you going to do about it."

Phoenix knew that one day they would do this but it didn't make it any easier now that that time had come.

"_Do we really have to?_

_Yes. You know we do. What if this place decides my father might be 'good entertainment' for us? It already released Malchior – not that he or Trigon could ever again be any real threat to us, but still, if it ever thinks that releasing something like them _outside _of this place would be more of a challenge..._

_True. We most definitely do NOT want to be responsible for what they could do. Raven... _

_Yes?_

_Cannot we perhaps at some other time, make this place again?_

_We will Star, most definitely we will."_

Phoenix sighed. "I suppose you had a good idea all along what's needed, but what we are going to do is..." The room blurred and faded from view along with the rest of Titans Tower leaving she and Ressie floating in the sky. Phoenix took one more look around her: directly below them was the bright yellow circle of the mustard moat with the Bourbon lake in front. On its left shore the small stand of pie trees that Star so loved was in full bloom, in back over a low rise was Gin lake flanked on its shores by clumps of bubble gum bushes now bursting with multi-colored balls.

"We're going to miss this place" she sniffed. As she turned back and looked to the Big Rock-candy Mountains they began to glow with a soft warm orange light as if a sun was setting behind them. The lighting started to shift and soon the entire mountain range began to light up in a wondrous display of softly muted colors as it refracted through their crystalline slopes.

Phoenix's eyes misted over at the beautiful sight, "I think this place knows it's time is up, that it's time for it to – die. It's putting on one last show for us."

"This is definitely one very special – home – you two made for yourselves. I never really understood the attachment a being could form to a simple location in space but I think that having been here with you two for so long in this _very_ special place, now... perhaps, I do."

The light from the mountains began to dim as did the sky. Phoenix gave another little sniff, "Goodbye. We will always keep you in our minds and one day we _will_ create you again. Like the Phoenix – like _us_ – you will rise again."

With that the entire landscape and then the realm itself along with the avatars of Ressie and Phoenix dissolved back into the softly glowing quantum fog of Eternity.

"_Well, you got us out of the house so to speak. Now what?"_

4


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter-3**

_Strange things are afoot_

Disembodied pieces of the consciousness's of Res'al and Phoenix drifted among the currents of reality sampling various multiple points in Time, Space, and Probability. After the dissolution of Phoenix's realm she had once again become adept at keeping herselves in multiple pieces – the 'cheese incident' as they came to call it had badly scared both Raven and Starfire. If a slime mold, albeit an advanced one that that had been engineered by the Ancients, could overwhelm them as a single physical beings... Well, that just would not do. Even though death was not a factor to them the idea of being catatonic for possibly a few thousand years _was_ something to be avoided. Beyond that, it all too well proved Res'al's point that physical avatars could be dangerous to herselves when they're made _too_ physiologically accurate. Phoenix made sure not to repeat that same mistake again.

At least the solution was simple: Just as Res'al and the rest of the Eternals did, they now just made sure that they were, as Res'al had put it, 'Not all there'. Keeping multiple bits of themselves spread throughout all there is, was, and could ever-be let them exist without fear of any single instance of themselves ever again totally succumbing to outside control of any sort simply because the other bits of themselves were of course aware of what all the other bits were doing. As Starfire had once put it 'It is much like watching one self's back', which was actually exactly what they always did now.

Beyond that, now like Res'al she only assumed an outward physical appearance whenever they interacted with other lifeforms. Res'al had noticed something else as well since the cheese incident, with all the various bits of herselves now spread throughout Eternity, all of them were as Phoenix. He wondered just what that psychoactive stuff created by the Ancients had done to their psyche, it was as if it had somehow even further cemented the mental union of her two selves. Not once had she again split into Raven and Starfire since they were exposed to that stuff and far more often then not, she thought and spoke as Phoenix with neither Star or Raven taking any lead.

He understood all too well that once the two of them had been joined into Phoenix that for the simple sake of sanity and being able to function it was mandatory that they think and act as one. Raven and Starfire had been bred and guided for just that and like a key in a lock the two fitted together perfectly and yet... While Phoenix was the combined psyches of Raven and Starfire, she wasn't _Raven_ or _Starfire._ He missed them and their little mental repartees between each other and suspected that while they stayed as Phoenix they didn't seem to know it yet, but they missed each other as well. The disturbing bit was that he was beginning to feel that he might have to do something about it and he did not like that possibility at all.

Damn! On this one point the rest of the Eternals were right: Start 'helping' once and it becomes harder and harder to know when it is _not_ the best thing to do. They took the stand of doing nothing and letting things work out as they will. His 'once' had been assisting in the creation of Phoenix. Now here he was fretting about his Lovers mental states and she being unable to forever ignore their past lives as 'Superheros' desperately wanting to 'Do Good' but afraid to. No wonder they were pariahs to the rest of the Eternals.

As it turned out, Life was forming its own solution to their problems.

At one point in their carousel of existence Res'al stopped and cocked his head. Not just one bit of him, _all_ of himselves everywhere and everywhen.

"What the... Oh. How very strange!" they all said.

Where & whenever she was with him Phoenix asked "What's up lover?".

"I'm not quite sure... I sense a disturbance in the web of life and time-lines around your Earth. Something... very very strange is about to happen there that I think you two need to be a part of."

That got Phoenix's full attention. "Earth! _Our_ Earth? What's happening on Earth? More to the point, what do you mean by 'we need to be a part of it'?"

"Hang on a moment." He stared into space a bit more as his consciousnesses briefly focused themselves on what they sensed. "I don't believe it! Again so soon? And like _that_!?..." Res'al shook his collective heads in puzzled disbelief.

As he began to get an idea of what he was sensing, he secluded a tiny part of himself and it thought, "_Life! You _do _seem to favor us with your weirdness. This just might be what Phoenix needs.._"

"Well?"

"I'm getting too much information. Every bit of me is getting the same thing! I don't know how or why but it's like a choir shouting! Arrggg! To keep down the echoes I'm stepping myselves back to the mists. I suggest you do the same" at which all of hims phased from where and when they were back to the formless quantum mists of Eternity leaving several rather startled Phoenix's staring into now vacant space.

An instant later Phoenix followed and they both consolidated themselves back to the Eternals home element. She was getting worried, for Res'al to actually want to pull into a more or less single being and have her do the same was unthinkable. It went against everything he had ever taught her! "_Just WHAT is going on?"_ she thought.

Outside of time and space between all that is and is not, the noise and confusion of what he had experienced faded to a manageable level and Res'al was able to finally focus on the event that had resonated throughout Starfire and Raven's home multiverse.

"Earth's people, all of them... They are on the cusp of what I think might be... well, _seems_ to be – an Ascension – and then again... it isn't. This is very bizarre – trying to look forward of that point is a mass of conflicting information, some is clear and some is not. It's almost like they didn't quite make it all the way and yet..."

Phoenix eagerly followed Res'al's mind to Earth and joined him in trying to see its people after the Change and also found she could not. It was if they no longer existed and yet, they could still sense a multitude of thoughts and emotions from the planet. Suddenly a single clear and unambiguous but at the same time puzzling vision came to them in a shifting series of panoramas..

Bodies. Human bodies. The plant was littered with them. From their condition they guessed this vision was at least 10 years after – what? Not a single human was alive on the entire planet but it seemed that to the last one, their skeletal remains screamed that their deaths were agonizing. There was no sign of war or cosmic catastrophe, or anything else obvious that could have been responsible and yet even all plant and animal life down to the molds and microbes was dead and the oceans were a foul looking chemically decaying soup. Emptied of life Earth's great cities still stood, now covered with dust and sand blown in from the barren lands around them. Devoid of life but physically intact, the entire planet was a dessicated corpse.

The vision then violently shifted: Again it was of Earth but now it was a garden planet filled with lush vegetation and teeming with animals – but not a single human. The cities still stood intact but overgrown and overrun with plants and animals. It seemed that bereft of human meddling they were once again flourishing.

But... there was a very – odd – sense of the people still being there even though they were nowhere to be seen. It was like a planet full of ghosts but even that wasn't right because 'ghosts' were just the spirit slightly shifted out of phase from normal life and Phoenix and Res'al could easily communicate with them. This was very different from that. It wasn't sensing that the people were still there that was odd, it was the psychic impressions of the people themselves that were. While alive and vibrant at the same time there was a cold and calculating undertone to them deep beneath the sensations of the people themselves. Neither Res'al or Phoenix had ever come across anything like it.

Once more the vision suddenly shifted and all they saw was darkness. They sensed an evil presence far more oppressive than even Trigon's and it projected a single thought with utterly evil glee: 'The Door is opening once more'.

There the visions ended leaving a bewildered Phoenix and Res'al.

They tried looking back before the Change and came across a blank spot in the time-line starting several years before their visions of Death. "How can this be?" Phoenix said. "We have observed Earth from the formation of its star system through its fiery end when the Sun dies and this event is not part of what should happen! We have seen other races cross from the corporeal to the non-corporeal and have briefly joined them in their new beginnings. We have observed some of them from the start of their race up to it's end. Why can we not do the same now?"

Res'al looked uncomfortable which worried Phoenix. Res'al hesitated before answering them. Finally, in a tone they had never heard him use before he simply said, "I don't know. As I said before, something has scrambled the time lines. The reality of this Earth, _your_ Earth, is being altered by something. It didn't split and begin to branch off another reality from the main trunk – it's changing into a different one. Frankly, I've never seen anything like it and didn't think it possible."

Now she was _really_ worried! She knew full well that Res'al didn't know everything but considering that he had seen virtually everything that this multiverse and others had and up to now at least – will – ever come up with, he was very good at grasping at least the core idea of situations and quite successfully winging it from there. As far as Phoenix knew, for him to say 'I don't know' about something – hell, anything - was a first.

"You _don't know?_ You're not even going to try a guess?"

"Nope. This is something that I have never came across before – and that's saying an awful lot"

"Oookaaay... Then what did you mean by 'we need to be apart of it'? Are you saying that you think that I'm responsible for everyone on Earth dying?"

"No, I think you need to be a part of it because I sensed a trace of your powers in that jumble and I'm pretty sure you did too, didn't you?" Phoenix was silent as he continued "Now unless you really screwed up somehow, I doubt that _you_ killed them. If anything, knowing you it's more likely that whatever is about to happen to Earth's people, you at least tried to make their physical end, ah, easier for them."

"Oh that just helps _sooooo_ much! First we cause the destruction of a galaxy and now are somehow mixed up with everyone on Earth being killed. Just great. Maybe we should just change our name to Kali, Destroyer of Worlds" Phoenix bitterly complained.

"Oh come on! They're not _exactly_ dead considering there is still something of them existing there."

"Yes. In one part of the vision. In the other they were far from alive. But are you so sure that what we sensed was Life? It was so – different."

"The fact that it _is_ Life is the only thing I am sure of, as to what kind and why the time-lines are in such a flux is the question."

"Along with what it is that _we_ have to do with it," Phoenix sighed resigning herselves to what was next. "Well, once again it seems that Life has a Plan for us and what is Life without Death. You say we need to be there. So be it. When do you suggest we pop in, just before the blank spot?"

"Seems like a good choice. While you're there I suggest you split back into your original selves and stick to your pre-Phoenix powers as much as possible." Res'al hesitated and then added, "Um, you do know that I'm not joining you right?"

"You're not! Why?" Phoenix cried.

"Because, well, I've just got this feeling that I don't belong there but you two do. Trust me on this, I have NEVER been this unsure about anything before. Even your creation was more predictable than this and _that_ had a near zero to the _n__th_ degree probability of happening."

"Uh huh. You know, we're getting the distinct feeling that you just don't like being near Earth. Just how much did you say were you involved with what the First One's did to create us?"

That took Res'al by surprise, "Where'd _that_ come from? That has nothing to do with anything happening to Earth right now."

Phoenix looked deep within Res'al, raised an eyebrow and continued, "you didn't say I was wrong."

"And I didn't say you were right. You know everything surrounding your creation and that I had damn little to do with it."

"Yeah... 'Damn little' as you say. We also know your favorite phrase about dealing with other lifeforms: 'If you do anything with them be careful! If you do too much they start to depend on you and lose their drive to create, do too little and they lose faith in the future. When you do things just right, they're never sure that you did anything at all.' That's starting to ring a little too familiar." As soon as Phoenix had said that she regretted it.

"And you two are getting off the point. You damn well know I don't play at what most races call 'God'. There are far too many advanced beings and races that have taken on that mantel and lived to regret it when the truth came out. Tell you what, while you split off and figure out what is happening to your Earth we can visit a few that tried that route: You'll find that a race that discovers its gods are false can be capable of devastating revenge – assuming that they don't self destruct from the discovery. Those races blessed enough to never know that sham do a good enough job of creating their own deities to praise or curse as events dictate without my help or that of the other Eternals." Res'al snapped back.

His tone softened a little but still carried a feeling of annoyance, "Listen, you think that I wouldn't love to be with you two there? I would because aside from your creation it is the most unique thing I've ever encountered, but I can't be there and I don't know why. It's just a feeling that this is something you two must do on your own. That's all there is to it."

"Okay! Okay! We get it, we're on our own for this. Sheesh!" Phoenix hurriedly said.

Res'al's heat faded from his thoughts as he finished, "One last thing – be careful and don't assume that anything is what it appears to be. It may be your Earth but something mighty strange is going on there. If things get too weird just let the whole thing go and sort itself out. Who knows? That might end up being what's supposed to happen anyway."

Phoenix detached a piece of her minds, "Thanks love. We'll do what needs to be done." she sent as she departed. The multiverse spun by her and as she phased through to Earth she grumbled to herselves, "_Right. 'Just let things sort themselves out' our firm and well toned ass! Something about this is really bothering him and we intend to find out what it is. Earth. Just great. I just hope they've finally got their act together because boy-howdy, it looks like they're running out of time to get it right."_

4


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter-4**

_Jump City_

The sun hung low on the horizon casting a warm golden glow onto a city that stood on the edge of a large bay on the Pacific Ocean. Heavy clouds that hung far on the horizon glowing deep red and orange were a stunning backdrop for the bay's oceanside inlet which was graced by a long, slender, and once beautiful cable-stayed bridge. Time had not been kind to it, now heavily overgrown with vegetation it looked more like a sculptured shrubbery than a bridge. From its single main support cable running down the middle several of the roadways thinner support cables had snapped or been cut and now dangled from broken roadway towards the water like gigantic vines. On the berms of the bridge's two piers and on sections of fallen roadway that still stood above the water large mammals basked in the rays of the setting sun.

The city itself looked as if it had seen far better times and those had long since left it to find a better location for themselves somewhere else. Its rather impressively tall buildings were still mostly intact with no outward signs of major structural damage but the city streets and lower portions of the buildings told another story. Like the city's once-proud bridge they too showed the signs of decades of neglect. Choked and overgrown with vegetation it looked like the people had long ago abandoned this place and followed the Good Times to wherever it was that they went to when they left this place.

Inside the bay at the edge of the city was a small island upon which a huge black statue stood. Close to the base of the statue the air briefly shimmered as Phoenix phased onto Earth. She looked around rather shocked at what they saw and felt.

"_Raven?_

_Yes Star?_

_This _is _Earth and Jump City is it not?"_

She gazed up at the black statue. Over 100 feet high it faced the city and was a single titanic arm raised to the sky, its hand had all fingers but one clenched into a fist. The one extended middle finger pointed to the sky.

_Well, our parting 'gift' to them is here and the landforms looks right so unless someone went through a lot of trouble and copied all of this, I'd have to say yes, it is._

_But... Why is it so warm and..." _Phoenix's hair was beginning to droop from the oppressive humidity that hung in the air. She gave a quick shake and it regained its fluff as with the slightest thought it was now impervious to the almost tropical conditions that had greeted them. "_wet in the air? It is almost evening here and yet it feels like midday in the jungles of this planet. What has happened here? It looks as if there has been no one here for many many years!"_

Phoenix again looked up at the statue. "_Well... We did tell the city to get screwed and from the looks of things, I'd say it has been royally boned."_

_But Raven, this city was one of great importance! The technologies of its companies and laboratories were among the best in the world. How could this happen to such a place?_

_Don't forget that the technologies of those same companies and labs were also responsible for most of the mutated creatures and super-villains we fought as Titans. Mmmmaybe something got out of hand"_ Phoenix looked at the cities edge again and chafed slightly in humid discomfort. "_WAY out of hand"_ she added.

Phoenix raised one hand and rubbed her temple, "_Look, Star..._

_Say no more. I agree!_

_Ok, remember Star – outside appearance only, no physical inputs beyond the basics! That should also take care of the feeling of this..." _She shook her hand to fling off some condensing water, "_air, and don't forget – pre-Phoenix powers only."_ A scant second later she thought the better of it and added, "_Make that pre-Phoenix... for now."_

A little irritated that Raven would think she'd forget, Star replied "_Yes mother"._

Phoenix slightly blurred and and began shifting shape splitting into her two selves each wearing their preferred clothes, Starfire in her purple miniskirt and crop top with jeweled bracer's on her arms and thigh-high thick-soled boots, Raven in her black unitard with her red jeweled belt hanging low on her waist, wrist guards and dark blue hooded cape & boots.

Starfire floated up a few feet into the air and with arms wide spun around. "Glorious!" she cried. Bemused, Raven stood there on the ground and took in the sight of her lover almost dancing in the air. "_I agree my love," _she thought to herself. "_It's been far too long since we've been – ourselves."_

"I'm glad you picked your, ah, more modest outfit Star. If we do ever find people here that strapped Tamaranian harness outfit of yours might cause a riot. I also think I understand why Res'al said we should be ourselves here: That talking to ourselves when joined as Phoenix is prrrretty weird and way too distracting."

"Truly it is the most – odd. But also it is quite the fun!" Starfire giggled then quietly continued, "Now that we are again separate I also realize that it has been far too long since we have talked like that. I think that when we are as Phoenix, she is beginning to assert herself more while we do less..."

Looking around once more she grew a bit pensive as her warrior senses picked something up. "It appears that this city has been devoid of its people for quite some time and yet, I feel that we are being watched. Do you not also sense someone here?"

"Raven briefly reached out with her mind and scanned the nearby city: Yes, I do and not just some_one, _this city is still inhabited! While there's not near as many as there was when we left this planet there are still hundred's of thousands living here but as to where they are... I can't get a fix on them being in any one spot, it's a general buzz of thoughts and just as we sensed in the mists there is something not quite right about them, the minds feel like they are in a dream or – well, I just can't put my finger on it. I wonder just _when_ this is. I have a feeling that it's not all that far after when we left. Hold on, I have an idea..."

Raven briefly touched the black shield she had left protecting their 'gift' from the humans retaliation then pulled back her hand. "Hmm, from power left in the shield I'd say that it's only been a little over a thousand years, twelve-hundred tops."

"Do you think that other cities are in this same... condition?"

"Possibly. When we were with Res'al in the mists we didn't sense any normal human thoughts did we? Only that strange sense of... cold logic. It doesn't meant there isn't anyone left unaffected but it _does_ mean that if there are, it's not many. No matter what, it's way too early to start making guesses. We need facts, not speculation from first impressions."

Raven looked around them one last time, "I wish we had arrived here in the morning instead of now. We should remind ourselves to check that little item next time we do something like this. Well we already set the rules for this visit so for now at least, there's no stepping forward or back a few hours . We aren't going to see anything more from here, we need a better view for a start and there's only a few hours of light left. Tell you what, you go left, I'll go right" she nodded as Raven rose into the air and with Starfire following headed towards the city where they split up to scout it from above.

The two of them sailed over the city until the sun had long set, scanning the terrain below and occasionally dipping lower to take a closer look at a peculiar feature on the buildings or in the landscape. They finally met again high in the bright broken moonlit sky over the shadowy center of the city. Looking up for a few seconds, Raven briefly smiled and spoke first, "I'm glad at least the moon is the same as we left it."

"I am as well. I think the piece missing gives it – character" Starfire agreed. "Although the ring of debris around Earth is much thinner than I remember it." Even as she spoke a small meteor streaked across the heavens in a bright slash of light before burning out.

"Well, it's had over a thousand years for some of the bits to fall to Earth or back towards the moon."

The smile left Raven's faced as she asked "I take it you saw pretty much the same thing I did?"

"I fear it is so. The entire lower parts of the city are dense forest. From the ground up to quite high the buildings appear to have been sealed off. There are no doors or other openings until very high above the trees, at least 100 meters from the ground was the lowest one I saw. Everywhere there is only the thick blanket of plants and trees. I saw no people, only a few small animals moving about, one was a quite large ape I think."

"Same here but I also saw what looked like a large green bear I think. I caught a glimpse of one of those apes or whatever they are as well. Fast aren't they? I only saw it out of the corner of my eye. I did sense a brutish sort of intelligence from it but no coherent thoughts. No trails or roads of any sort, not even any remains of them. I still sense what has to be people here but how do they move around? Where do they get their food or power? I scanned what was one of the cities power plants and it was long dead, its xenobium power core has been completely depleted. Like the rest of the city the plant looks abandoned for decades "

"And yet, everywhere I felt – the eyes." Starfire rubbed her arms together, "It is most... disconcerting."

"I know what you mean, I feel it too" Raven said. "I think that we're being watched remotely. There are definitely no people I can directly sense, just that weird general buzz of distant thoughts all around. Well, I guess the next step is to pick a building and enter it. There _are_ people around here somewhere and we need to find them to start getting to the bottom of this."

Starfire looked down at the light-less expanse of buildings below them. "With which do you wish to start?"

As if in reply, a single solitary window high on a tall building set against the foothills a few kilometers away dimly lit up and caught their eye. "Okaaay, how about _that_ one?" Raven drawled.

As they slowly drifted towards the faint light without saying or thinking a word both knew that this was probably going to be a trap of some sorts. If it was, it was ridiculously obvious and whoever was setting it up was going to get a very rude surprise if they tried to injure or capture them. For now they may be using only their pre-Phoenix powers but they were still far from defenseless.

While Starfire had her starbolts which were of quite respectable power and her tremendous strength, Raven could be what Star liked to call a planet-cracker. The broken moon shining above them and shattered Mars were testament to what she was capable of when she said damn the consequences and pulled out all the stops. Her only problem was that just as it was before she and Starfire were joined as Phoenix, her power was exponential in nature – each step up was ten times the energy of the last which made a very fine line between power to level a building and leveling large parts of a city by accident. As a result, for now at least she had to keep to the very low end of her abilities during any ground combat.

More than that, they had had a _lot_ of practice in BCRM playing at just this sort of game. The fact that this was 'real' just made it more interesting and both were almost hoping it _was_ some kind of trap. If whoever – or whatever – was behind this did manage to damage or destroy their avatars they'd be back in an instant with no-holds barred retaliation.

"I was over that area earlier" Starfire said as they floated towards the lure. "It appeared to be an expansive industrial area. Most of the other structures are solid looking blocks with no openings at all. That is the only one high enough above the trees to have openings or windows. I wonder what it is that this city has sealed itself against, is it something that lives on the ground or in the trees?"

"I've been thinking about that too. I doubt that it's those apelike things we glimpsed, I'd expect even simple firearms could take care of them if they were a threat. Hold on minute..." Starfire saw that Raven had stopped and appeared to be listening to something. After a minute or so she asked, "What is it you hear?"

"Nothing. Isn't a bit strange that with such lush growth everywhere, you can't hear any animals. You would think that this place would be crawling with them. We saw a lot of them in the bay and those few here on land but nowhere near as many as we saw in the vision. Do you hear anything? You've got the best hearing Star."

"_Raven is right about that"_ Starfire thought to herself as she listened hard. She remembered Raven once thinking she was making a joke by saying that Star could hear a mouse pissing on cotton at ten paces away – too bad it fell flat when Starfire in all seriousness informed her that she really could. As she focused and listened she realized Raven was right! Aside from a few grunts and low roars from the marine mammals they had seen in the bay all she heard were two large creatures bawling at each other several kilometers away.

"Raven, you are right! In a forest such as this there should be many creatures both large and small roaming the night and yet on land I hear only two and they are very far away. This becomes more and more of the curious."

"It certainly does. But that has to wait. Let's get back to our little invitation up ahead" Raven said as they continued on again. As they approached the building they saw it was one of the few ornate ones they had seen in the city. While definitely not the tallest, compared to all the rest in the city a least form a distance it certainly did have an imaginative style. Most of the other buildings were the apparently still standard boring boxes that had first began sprouting in Earth's cities around the time that humans were learning to play with the atom. As they grew closer, it gave them pause to consider if the first designers of those ever dreamed that while architecture would have its fanciful moments – like the one they were approaching – overall it would be their simple multi-storied boxes of glass and other materials that would set the standard for ages to come.

When Raven and Starfire were close enough to see some details they saw that this building was a dozy. If it had ever given birth to any standards, they would have been immediately taken out and drowned to put them out of their misery. It looked like three completely different plans from different cultures -one being totally inhuman - had been used to build it: The massive lower section was reminiscent of a Gothic cathedral that covered the area of an entire square city block complete with tall baroque spires at the four corners, each spire with far too many stone gargoyles perched on them even for Raven. Starting about 50 meters up the walls abruptly changed to a smooth pyramid shape that rose another 50 meters before it changed to a shape like a monstrous mutated sea anemone. If the base was notable for its sheer area, this top section would have to be for its strangeness. At least a full hundred meters tall the 'body' was a solid round column rising straight up from the pyramid portion with dozens of tentacle-like appendages protruding out from the top each wide enough around to hold several stories of rooms or at least one very very large one and again each appendage was about 50 meters long. The building was so hideous it almost hurt ones brain to even look at it.

The light was coming from a room in one of the tentacle-like extensions near the top of the building. They stopped a short distance away and gawked, in the bright moonlight they could just make out that the lower Gothic portion and the 'anemone' were totally covered in horrific large statues and friezes carved right into the walls that strongly reminded Raven of the visions of a tortured Earth and its peoples that Trigon had sent her before his second coming.

Star spoke first, "This building is most... disturbing. It think that whoever built it had large problems with the nightmare and I pity whoever or _what_ever once lived or worked here. I do not think we should linger here at night."

"You can say that again." Raven again looked over and appraised the structure. "I wonder what's with the proportions? Fifty, fifty, one hundred and the tentacles tip to opposite-tip is another hundred. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that the length of the base is some multiple of those as well. Someone went through a lot of trouble to make this thing very precise – and ugly. In this light this place is too creepy even for me! I'd really like to study this in the daylight but, once again though that's going to have to wait. Well my dear, shall we see what's inside of this place?"

They drifted up to the lit window and peered inside. All that could be seen from outside was a barren solid white room. Mounted on a pedestal in the center was a single glowing orb giving off a soft amber light. Raven had a disturbing idea of what that orb which was the sole source of the light which had lured them here might be, "_It can't be one of those," _she thought to herself "_there's no way they could have yet discovered how to make them!"_

"Looks like no one is home and since we don't know where the entrances are or even if there are any..." Raven motioned towards the window, "Do you want the honors?"

"Piece of the cake" Starfire replied as she threw a single blazing green starbolt at the adjacent wall which blew a sizable hole through it. Strangely the edges of the hole were not torn and jagged but instead smooth like a plastic that had flowed away from the force of the starbolt. "Ah, I meant for you to take out the window but that should do fine" Raven said.

"Oops. Ah, Raven..."

They looked at the opening Star had made and saw that it was beginning to slowly close back together almost as if the wall was healing itself."I wonder what this place is made of?" Raven asked to no one in particular. " It's not a solid metal, the closest thing to it we've seen was on that robot planet on the edge of Andromeda."

"I remember it. They and their cities were made of.." Star paused as she tried to remember the word.

"Nannites." Raven finished for her.

"Yes, that is it. The tiny robots like a grain of fine sand that were able to assemble themselves into any shape desired. But Raven, those had a ... texture to them. Things made of them felt like packed fine sand." Starfire ran a hand along the slowly moving edge, this is perfectly smooth."

"Hmm, well whatever it is Star, it's starting to close faster so we better get moving."

As they floated through the opening and into the room they saw that aside from two depressions in the walls at opposite ends of the room that might be doors, the still intact window, and the pedestal with its volleyball-sized glowing orb the room was featureless and sterile looking. Its interior was a smooth seamless shiny white material and where the floor and ceiling joined with the curving walls they simply flowed together through a large arc, even the pedestal was a smooth extrusion rising from the floor. No chairs or tables or anything else was to be seen. "It seems the purpose of this room is only to hold this object" Star said as she began reaching for it.

"No! Don't touch it!" Raven almost screamed. "Let me take a closer look first." Raven circled it a few times looking deep into it and probing it with her mind. The orb was a mesmerizing swirl of glowing amber and orange colors moving as if they were almost alive. As she gently and briefly touched it with her mind the orb began to slowly pulse growing slightly brighter and then dimmer several times. Raven withdrew her mind from it and the orb resumed is original brightness. "_Oh no, it IS! What on Earth is one of these doing here? Which one are you... and where are your sisters?"_ she quietly said to herself.

"What is it Raven? Have you seen something such as this orb before?"

Raven sounded both worried and puzzled as she answered, "Yes, I've seen one of these before... It's a transport orb used as a teleport device and type of data link. The Ancients came up with them not long after their first stargates and several other races after them also figured out how to make and use them. Transport orbs work in much the same way as the gates in that you need one at each end of the link but they are much more portable. Its range is usually limited to a few light years so they were only for local connections within a single star system unless another system also was in their range. These things only glow when they are active."

"Which means that this one is ... operating?" Star cautiously asked. "Can you tell what it is doing?"

"It's definitely in use, as for what... there's no way to tell. Since nothing is appearing here and it's operating at a very low level it's probably acting as a link between what ever has been observing us and wherever the people are. What bothers me most is that this is a _Mu_ transport orb. There were only a few of these things left because they were only used for a few thousand years until the Mu ascended into the Azar and had no further need of them. As far as I know all of the remaining orbs were kept in Azarath as relics from their distant beginnings."

"But how can that be! Azarath was destroyed! You, I mean... _we_ vaporized it. When we fought your father the dimension itself collapsed into the Void."

"Yessss," Raven hesitantly started, "but that doesn't mean that a few bits of it weren't thrown clear during the final cataclysm of the dimensions collapse. After all, part of Trigon was. When moon was blasted by the energy that leaked out during the end its debris could easily hide anything of Azarath that may have been thrown into Earthspace. Just as we thought that my father had been destroyed, it never occurred to any of us to think that anything of the Azar would have survived either."

Starfire puzzled for a moment, "And when we as Phoenix restored the galaxy we made it _exactly_ as it was before the Trigons final destruction of it. We restored it all, including the debris from our earlier battle with him."

Raven looked glum as knowledge buried beep in her mind by the Azar surfaced. She glanced at the orb and seeing that it was still at very low activity told Star "It gets better. Look, the orb is stable with no activity for us to worry about and since this is going to take a while to explain we might as well get comfortable." She folded her legs to lotus position as she floated a bit off of the floor.

Starfire looked behind them and saw that the wall had by now almost completely healed itself, only a small hole barely big enough to stick their head through was left. Of course it didn't worry her because they could always again simply blast or phase themselves out of this place. What _did_ bother her was being so close to something that concerned Raven so much.

Seeing that Raven didn't seem to share her fear she shrugged her shoulders and joined her in lotus as Raven continued. "Those Mu transport orbs the Azar kept were the last five the Mu ever made before they ascended. The orbs were not only able to link and cross local space – they were trans-dimensional, existing in many different dimensions at the same time and able to link those dimensions as well. In short, they were to keys the Azar's mastery of manipulating dimensions and to their creating the dimension of Azarath.

Being trans-dimensional in nature they couldn't be destroyed even by the Azar so instead they were put somewhere safe. The Azar didn't just keep them as ancient relics, they were keeping them isolated from this universe, from _this_ dimension."

Starfire remembered some of their dim-hopping travels: Most were rather interesting, a few were mundane variants of Realspace, and a few were terrifying places filled with creatures that would be a nightmare to any intelligent race no matter how fierce. "I suspect that the Azar came across a dimension inhabited by a race that was not... nice?"

"That they did my Love, that they did. As advanced as the Azar were, even they made mistakes. Lots of them, and far too many were HUGE ones. The worst was while using the orbs and learning the in's & out's of manipulating the dimensions: they opened one door too many and came across something... Bad... REAL bad."

"What was it they found? The kracken warriors of Yog Soth in dimension 872? The spirit reapers in 489 or the soul vampires and other undead in dim-666?" Starfire excitedly asked.

"No." Raven quietly replied. She took a deep breath and finished, "They found another race of Azar. _Evil_ Azar. They called themselves 'The Hand' for in their realm, they are the Hand that that controls all, the Hand that grants life to serve them and the Hand that takes life to serve them, the Hand that reaches out and takes all for itself.

Intensely telepathic, telekinetic and utterly evil, they made the Shriva look like timid sheep and would have thought Trigon a wasteful and bellicose idiot for his actions. Trigon used the lifeforce of other races and worlds to gain energy for his Powers and usually utterly consumed them within seconds. The Hand used other races and lifeforms for the exact same reasons as well – but very slowly drained them. That way they can be used as slaves as well as a lasting source of life-energy. Unlike _my_ Azar the Hand never left the Earth to allow life to develop there on its own after they Ascended but instead used the evolving proto-humans – what evolved into the current crop of humans in this dimension – as slaves and cattle to be slowly drained of Lifeforce to feed the Hand as they spread their iron-fisted rule throughout their galaxy and beyond."

Starfire was horrified.

"They also had transport orbs and they too had developed trans-dimensional ones but luckily none were directly linked to any orbs the Mu had made. Unfortunately, one of their orbs and one of Mu's did _share_ a dimension the Hand was in the process of conquering and eventually they learned of it. Once they found out they could use that shared dimension as a way point to ours they made their move at once. Several advance forces of the Hand came through to Azarath and caused untold chaos and destruction. Because of how the Hand operates, the Azar called this the Mind War: they telepathically enslaved many of the Azar and turned them against their own people. For the first and only time in their history, Azar fought Azar.

Eventually Azarath stopped the Hand and their forced allies but at the cost of hundreds of my peoples lives. Remember, even at their peak there were never more than several thousand Azar alive at any one time and because of Azarath's low birthrate it took them thousands of years to recover from the loss. In the end the Azar only won because they were able to locate and seize the orb the Hand were using and by encasing it in a dimensional shield-barrier that blocked all transference through it the Hand were forever blocked from using it again. Once the Mind War was over the other 4 orbs were isolated in the same way and locked deep within Azarath to prevent the possibility of anything like that ever happening again."

Deeply disturbed by all this Starfire had to ask, "Can you tell if this orb is the one this 'Hand' used? In the mists with Res'al did we not sense a great evil and their thoughts of a door that is being opened once more?"

Raven nodded at the orb in front of them. "The orbs have no markings so there is no way to know, but since the Hand is not here – yet – I don't think this is the one they used. The problem is, if _this_ orb and whichever one it is linked to survived and made it Earth the others may have as well. If they did then we have to assume that like this one their shields were damaged or destroyed during the destruction of Azarath. If the one used by the Hand had a damaged barrier they were probably trying to break through it which would explain that part of the vision."

Starfire unfolded herself and stood up, "Then we need to find those orbs and destroy them before the Hand succeeds. The Azar may not have been able to get rid of them but, if not by ourselves then as Phoenix, _we_ can!"

A worried look crossed Starfire's face, "Umm, Raven... I have but one more question."

"Yes?"

"With only our current powers, how can we find them?"

Raven began unfolding her legs to stand as she simply replied "Don't know, but I bet a good place to start is by going to wherever this orb leads to. Remember, we still need to find what happened to the people here and from there hopefully learn where they found this one – and learned how to use it. Something is happening here that drove the people into hiding and there has to be a connection between that vision we had and finding a Mu orb here on Earth."

The two of them floated closer to the softly glowing orb. As Starfire gazed into it and watched the slowly swirling iridescent streamers in it she said, "It is most beautiful. How do we operate it?"

"For transport it's easy and since there is already a link established we'll just follow it. They work like this," Raven took Star's hand in hers and placed them both on the orb. Starfire noted that it was strangely cold to the touch then noticed that the streamers inside of it began to spin faster and faster. Suddenly a burst of light sprang from deep within it as the room faded from view. Just the same as when using one of Raven's transport portals Starfire had the odd sensation of being slurped through a straw as they were drawn through a tunnel of brilliant multi-colored lights.

Hand-in-hand they traveled as dazzling streamers of energies danced around them arraigning themselves into complex geometric patterns which persisted for a brief time before unraveling and fading away. Shortly a gigantic hexagram seal with intricate eldritch symbols appeared directly in their path as they rushed towards it. "_What the...? The seal of Azarath!"_ an astonished Raven thought to herself. "I hope this works Star" she said as she gathered strength and then spoke her Words of Power. "AZARATH, METRION, **ZINTHOS!**"

The seal shattered in a scintillating display of brilliant blue sparks and they were through to the other side of the link. Another room fuzzed into being around them and they found themselves facing another orb identical to the one they had left in that hideous building.

They blinked several times from a harsh light that filled the room. As their eyes grew accustomed to it Raven said, "Well, this makes two of the orbs we know of. Only three left to find." As they looked beyond the orb they saw the room was quite large and very high-tech. Dozens of large holographic vid-windows hung in the air above complex unmanned control consoles while overhead, brilliant long crystal rods gave off the garish light that flooded the room. The displays showed ever changing views of the city and areas surrounding it.

Starfire pointed to one display that was static with images of her and Raven on it, in the lower portion of the screen two words in large red type were slowly flashing 'Match Found'. Always one to state the obvious, "I believe we have found the monitor room from where we were being observed" she said.

A new voice from behind greeted them. "You certainly have. Why have you two come back to Earth?"

Raven and Starfire snapped around to face this new voice and saw a very attractive bespectacled female about 30 give or take a few Earth years old with greenish-blue skin, short black hair, bright red lipstick and a chest easily as impressive as Raven's. Both of their eyey went wide for a split-second, the woman was wearing a skin-tight dark-copper colored uniform that looked almost like it was painted on her but that wasn't what caused their mild surprise because held in her arms and pointed directly at them was a large and rather fiendish-looking device. The main body of it was cylindrical, almost a meter long, as thick as her arm and the end pointed at them had a glowing deep-violet crystal mounted in the center of three very long and wicked-looking spikes. That definitely did not look like it was a good end to to have pointing at you.

The woman shifted the device in her arms. "I'll ask you once more. Why have you two returned to Earth?"

9


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter-5**

_Contact!_

Raven was unimpressed. "Another note to ourselves Star... next time we use one of those things, face different directions." She already had a shield ready to form to deflect whatever energies that thing the woman was holding might release when she continued, "Ah, do you mind pointing that a different direction? You might damage some of your equipment around here." Starfire was at the ready with both hands ablaze with green balls of energy just waiting to be released. "Do not think that you can threaten us with such a device!" she said sternly as she raised her arms preparing to throw her starbolts.

The woman looked at the device in her arms and smiled. "What, this?" She gave it a couple hefts, "Hmm, I suppose it _does_ look a bit frightful." She moved to the console next to her and jamming the device into a receptacle in the floor next to it the console came alive with lights. "But, it's not a weapon. It's a Maxwell/Heisenberg Bose-condensate stabilizer to lock the orb against further physical transport. It can still relay telemetry but that's it. I had to remove it to allow you to come through without too much trouble. Now that you're here we don't want any unexpected visitors stepping through do we?" She touched a few spots on the console and a smooth white mass flowed up from the floor and encased the orb. It looked like the same material as the walls of the building holding the first orb.

"_Interesting,"_ Raven thought to herself. "_but it won't stop a psychic attack from the Hand and once they have the mind, they own the body."_

Starfire lowered her arms and the glow faded away from her hands. "Then, you have had... unwelcome visitors come through before?"

"Not so much unwelcome as uninvited. While they were initially quite happy to share their tech and culture with us we prefer to ah, control, who we allow through." She gave a hard look at Starfire and Raven, "While Earth is not as xenophobic as it was when you were here, many of us still are not exactly comfortable dealing with – outsiders, so that's left to a select few of us. Some of them have been a little more, shall we say... different than expected. That grotesque building at the edge of the city holding the orb was partly designed by some of them and used to house our latest visitors until they stopped coming a several years ago. The campus it's in was a xeno-tech research facility where we adapted their technology to our needs."

She put her hands on her hips and haughtily continued, "What is it with you aliens and leaving parting 'gifts' anyway? While that building wasn't pleasant to look at to begin with, just before the last ones left they changed it and added those nightmarish friezes to its outside. If it's supposed to be an insult or mean something, well, we have no idea what to make of it. At least _yours_ is pretty damn clear in what you meant when you created it."

As Raven knocked on the hard white material covering the orb Starfire sent her a thought, _"She says they may not be as bad as they were, but her tone and attitude are... stiff. She carries a familiar arrogance of supposed superiority about her."_

"_I agree. She reminds me of how the humans were acting when we left Earth but more – practiced at it. Too bad."_ Raven sent back.Ignoring the bit about parting 'gifts' she replied, "Ok, that helps to explain this stuff and the design of that building. You asked why we've come back to Earth. I take it you think you know who we are otherwise you wouldn't have, ah... invited us here so casually."

"Did you really think that the people of Earth, much less Jump City could forget who you two seem to be?" She looked to the the vid-window with the images of Starfire and Raven on it and made a few odd gestures with her hand. The window split into three, one for Star and one for Raven and in between them a tall and narrow window of their parting 'gift', each was joined by several much smaller satellite windows showing various records and pictures. "Even in the days of the Titans data storage was too good and diversified for anything important to ever be forgotten or lost anymore. Once placed on the Net it spreads and will always exist somewhere, you just have to know how to find it."

She consulted the data screens and read some of the information to them, "Raven Ralston: Birth date unknown, race – claimed to be 'Azar' although questionable because no confirmed race of that name has ever been found." The last lines of information on Raven she didn't read aloud having entered it herself soon after they were spotted near the Gift. Side note: Artifacts recovered from moon orbit 75 years ago do fit limited descriptions of possible Azar origin (see AZAR). If subject is confirmed deep-scan for further information on Azar technology if possible and genetic extraction of Azar physiology.

She continued reading, "Starfire – last name unknown, birth date unknown, race – Tamaranian. Both members of a small band of 'Super-heroes' with beyond normal human abilities for the time known as the Teen Titans and later as just the Titans. All members except two of said group either killed in action or died of natural causes. At time of their departure from Earthspace the remaining two super-heroes were Starfire and Raven." She gave the two a quizzical look, "Apparently well-preserved ones at that, having been on Earth for over 500 years before leaving it a bit over one-thousand years ago. I must say, you two certainly do age well. It looks like you haven't aged a day!"

"Thanks, we haven't" Raven matter-of-factly replied.

"Where was I? Oh yes, you left that indestructible statue in the bay telling the city to get screwed just a month before Earth was... Things are a bit fuzzy here." Maybe later you will help fill it in. She looked hard at them as she went on, "The general consensus is that Earth was destroyed by a huge red Demon and then somehow restored to exactly as it was by something – or someone – unknown. Everyone unequivocally and vividly recalled the destruction and death of the Earth. The next things remembered was being alive again and everything being restored. That was shortly followed by memories of not just the Earth being destroyed but scores of worlds suffering the same horrific death and rebirth. Those memories ended in a message, a message of hope and tolerance – and a warning about taking the meaning of our salivation the wrong way.

Of course the worlds governments tried to claim it was some kind of mass hallucination caused by Alien Outsiders and considering you two conveniently left just before it happened more than a few blamed it on you two. Oddly enough, for once the People didn't buy either story. They knew exactly what happened; That they _had_ died and the Earth _was_ destroyed along with countless other worlds and races then miraculously reborn. We had been Saved and therefore there had to be a Reason that went beyond Earths now seemingly petty squabbles over religions or control over other countries. After that, they tried to welcome change and tolerance and for quite some time, things were almost peaceful here. Too bad it didn't last."

The woman sighed, "You can learn about all that later if you want but for now, as you probably already knew I was listening to your little talk in the orb room. I'm not sure if I should believe that you _are_ the ones responsible for restoring Earth and other the worlds... You said the entire galaxy, but come on! That sounds _way_ beyond anything known about you two." Raven and Star just shot a small smile at each other.

She made another gesture and the windows collapsed back into one. "So. Raven and Starfire, ageless former superheros of Earth, what brings you back here after 1,056 years? Something to do with this 'Hand' you were talking about? Are they responsible the localized reality distortions Earth has been experiencing?"

Starfire spoke up first. "Since you know who we are, before we reply further should we not know who _you_ are? As a friend of ours once said, we cannot just call you by the 'Hey you' or 'Green one'. Also, I do not recall any pure-bred humans who look such as you, are you a mutant?" Raven discretely kicked Starfire in the foot for the mutant question.

The woman smiled, "Fair enough. I'm Kyria, Kyria Matrix, more or less the leader of this city you have entered and regional commander of the Global Alien-affairs Group. Given who you seem to be it was decided that you be given the ah, highest attention."

"Then we are most pleased to meet you Kyria Kyria Matrix regional commander of GAG."

Kyria put a hand to her mouth for a second and giggled, "Just one Kyria. Glad to see the records were right about you Starfire."

"Hmm?"

"Never mind. As for 'pure-bred', I'm 100 human if that's what you mean though most of us do have a large amount of what you called 'mutant' blood in us. Even before you left Earth the mutation rate was fairly high thanks to unrestricted playing with genetics. Your Beast Boy, Kid Flash, Jinx and others of their ilk were prime examples of the early stages." Kyria hesitated a second then went on, "After our... death and rebirth... just a few more generations after you two left the mutation rate spiked and..." A troubled look crossed Kyria's face, "For now, let's just say that evolution ran its course.

Back to the subject – why are you here?"

"First, what kind of – reality distortions as you called them, are you talking about?" Raven asked. "Because that's what drew us here. Something here is not... as it should be. As for the Hand being the ones causing it, we don't know. We just got here, remember?

They only came up because we found that you have come across some very dangerous technology far beyond your current ability to contain or fully comprehend – those transport orbs. Seeing the precautions you are taking you seem to realize that. What you don't know is just _how_ dangerous they are. If the Hand find access to your orbs and want to come through, they will and nothing you have will stop them. From what I've seen so far, your 'defenses' as you called them would be like paper to them. Look, you may be curious about us but we are even more curious about you and Earth. Just where are we right now and what has happened here that the land, the city, and the people are so different?"

Kyria hesitated a few seconds then touched her right ear and spoke softly. She touched a few different lighted pads on the console in front of her and they heard equipment being powered down. "Get ready for a rare treat for Outsiders," she told them as a door to the right of them opened and gave them a tantalizing glimpse of what was outside of the monitor room. "I hope you don't mind that we had taken precautions before luring you two here." Kyria motioned to the door, " Now that the shield around this room is down, care to take a walk so I can show you around our city? We can talk and maybe get something to eat. You should be impressed with what we've done while you were away."

Starfire sent another thought to Raven, _"Raven, I have the feeling that Res'al was correct. Things here feel quite... strange and not at all as they seem."_

Something was not right here. Raven briefly and ever so lightly touched Kyria's mind with hers and what she found disturbed her. Kyria was definitely human but still, underneath was that same cold... she looked slightly to the left and then to the right at the room they were in, technical. That was the word she was looking for! Underlying Kyria's personality and all the other minds she had sensed was a technical or cybernetic base to them all!

"_Star! They're part A-I. They're all_ part _A-I! That's what the strangeness in their minds is!_

"_!!!"_

Kyria led them through the door and they stepped out onto an expansive terrace and a it was a very high one at that. Raven and Starfire both gasped at the city laid out before them. "Welcome to Cyber City-1" Kyria said.

The monitor room was in the top of a tower that had to be at least a kilometer tall. They looked around and saw its glass-smooth outer wall shimmered with a dark metallic-blue sheen. They looked over edge of a railing that flowed up from the edge of the floor and glowed electric blue. They gasped as they saw that the city itself stretched as far as they could see in a riot of various-colored opalescent-skinned smoothly flowing and gracefully curved towers that glimmered and shone as if created from light made solid._"Crap!"_ Raven sent Star. _"This is what I think we expected to see when we first got here! I have a baaad feeling that they're going to make us have to damage it."_

They looked down over the edge and far below between the buildings they saw expansive parks and broad streets crowded with people while higher up, hover vehicles ranging from personal sky-boards to heavy haulers silently glided through the air moving cargo and more people. Raven noted to herself that many of the inhabitants had at least basic levitation abilities and didn't require outside aid. From where they were high on the tower it was hard to tell but it didn't look like all of the people were quite human, or even humanoid. Wildly different colors, sizes and shapes could be made out but that was all.

"It appears your city has an interesting mix of... inhabitants." Starfire noted to no one in particular.

Kyria icily replied "I told you Earth has a high mutation rate. Do you have a problem with that?"

A bit surprised at her change in attitude Starfire replied "None at all, why should we have the problem? I was from Tamaran, Raven was Azar, and we have traveled to many different worlds and realms. To us people are simply, people. We learned long ago all can good or bad. The jerks and holes of the behind come in all different shapes, sizes, creeds and colors."

"Good attitude for an Outsider to have around here but don't expect the same back from anyone here." Kyria cryptically answered back

The tower they were on was one of four in a ring that were connected with insanely long and thin skybridges which also sprang from each tower and led to a central structure three times the girth of the outer towers, around its perimeter at the same level as the skyways were several small golden pyramids. The top of the central building was a large shimmering white dome topped with very large crystalline structure which was emitting a tremendous golden beam of energy that streamed upwards until it reached what looked like the sky overhead where it split into five large radials that spread out across the sky until they disappeared into the horizon.

And what a sky! It was a mesmerizing intricate golden web of uncountable triangles that slowly shimmered as their centers shifted colors back and forth between purple and electric blue. Both Raven and Starfire stared at it entranced for what seemed minutes. "Glorious!" Starfire gasped while Raven frowned. Kyria smiled at them and turned, "Shall we take our walk?" She remembered a tidbit from the records on Raven and Starfire and added "I know of a nice diner that serves great pizza and has some lovely teas."

Her last statement pushed Raven over the edge. "_Star, get ready,"_ she sent. As Kyria started walking towards a vertical transport tube it became encased in a gleaming black sheen as Raven threw a shield around it. Kyria stopped in her tracks, touched her right ear and softly said just two words, "bugger em". As soon as the shield started to appear Starfire had lit up her hands with energy and her eyes blazed fiery green as Raven commanded, "Okaayy ... Hold it right there! Enough of the cheery welcome and your little evasions. Before we go any further here Ms. Matrix, you either answer a few questions right now or we are out of here: Just where are we, what are you, and..." she nodded towards the sky, "how did your people find out how to create an Azar shield wall?"

Kyria quickly turned to face them again and gave an antagonistic scowl just before a bright white ball of energy creased the air between them and her rapidly followed by several more. Starfire and Raven spun around to face where the balls of charged plasma had come from and saw a rapier sleek aerial craft rapidly diving from the sky at them. More brilliant balls erupted from the craft striking the floor around them. "HA, YA, HA! Star screamed as she flew into the air and unleashed a flurry of starbolts that struck the fighter which erupted in a blossoming fireball and began spiraling in flames to the ground below. Raven called up to her "Good shot Star! There's probab... hnuuh!"

Raven was cut off as a snarling Kyria slammed her foot into Raven's back with a flying kick knocking her astonishingly hard into the tower wall. As she slammed against it Raven saw Kyria rapidly transform into a green and solidly-muscled feral – almost wolfish, humanoid form over two meters tall with huge canines and _very_ long and no doubt sharp claws at the end of her muscular arms. Her hair now ran as a full stiff black mane down her entire back and continued into a long bushy tail. It seemed that the uniform she wore was a part of the morph as no trace of it was to be seen on her, in its place was mostly short dark-green fur and a very brief two-piece outfit covering her loins and breasts. The now fully were-beast Kyria threw back her head and let out a deafening guttural roar.

"Whoa! Aren't _you_ a right-proper bitch!" Raven snarled back at her. With another roar Kyria sprung towards Raven with her snarling jaws open and with clawed hands out in front but just before reaching her crashed against a dark shield band Raven had thrown up with a slash of her hand.

By this time several more heavily armored fighter craft were now closing in on their position and firing at Starfire. The shots streaked by her with most going very wide of their mark, the few that came close she was easily dodging. Making fun of their poor aim Star turned to Raven and loudly laughed, "They shoot as well as would a blind Snoggluth! YEEP!" One pilot got several shots within inches of the distracted Tamaranian warrior and then one struck her in her side exploding in a concussion of light and sound followed by a second one.

"Glaaah hnuuh!" she grunted as the blasts threw her back several meters. Shaken but unhurt and now furious, she unleashed another fusillade of blazing green starbolts and eye-beams towards the fighters, clearing the sky with ease.

As Kyria had recoiled against Ravens shield she snapped her body around, landed on all fours to the side of the shield and once more sprang for Raven again leading with fangs and claws. Her snarling attack was stopped in mid-air with a yelp of pain as Raven extended a claw of black energy from her hand which seized the almost rabid green were-beast and slammed her into the wall and pinned her there. "Oh no YOU **DON'T**!" Raven screamed through clenched teeth.

More armored craft could be seen streaking towards them from across the city as several dozens of heavily armed and very large angry looking creatures began pouring out from the two towers and onto the bridges on either side of them that connected to where they were. Raven threw up a spherical shield that enclosed her, Kyria, Starfire and a good bit of the tower around them within it. "So you're going to make us do this the hard way, are you bitch?" Raven angrily said. The green beast just continued snarling and struggling to break free from the iron grip of Raven's black claw. "We don't want to hurt you or kill anymore of your people. _**Just answer our questions!**_"

More snarls and frantic but useless struggling were all she got in reply. A barrage of energy bolts and explosive projectiles began bombarding Raven's shield from both of the groups charging at them from the towers and from the fighters that were now in range of them. With a hopeful look on her face Starfire turned to Raven and simply asked "Shall I, my love?"

Raven gave the struggling beast a hard look, snorted in disgust, then turned her head towards Star and replied "Have at it my dear." She returned her gaze to the still struggling beast, "_Watch and learn,_" she coldly told her.

With wild eyes Kyria stopped her struggles and watched as Starfire gathered strength for a few seconds and then with two ear-splitting war cries, unleashed twin torrents of starbolts one after the other at the two surging crowds who had now almost reached the middle of the skybridges. Tremendous explosions rocked the air and shook the towers as the two bridges and all those on them were blown apart from the mid-point of their spans all the way back to the towers at their far ends raining huge chunks of flaming debris and scores of smoking bodies down onto the streets below. No one was left on the remaining stubs of the bridges precariously clinging to the tower Raven and Star were on. Some of the closest fighters wildly banked to avoid the debris flying through the air but one was solidly struck and exploded while several more crashed into the towers on either side as they tried to evade the destruction. Starfire threw several more volleys of starbolts and all too soon the sky was again empty except for smoke rising up from below."

Still floating a bit off of the ground she returned closer to Raven and with sad eyes watched the rain of ruin fall to earth. With a warriors philosophy Starfire said aloud to Raven and Kyria behind her, "I hope they learn the lesson soon. It is a shame to kill so many brave fighters so needlessly." Starfire turned and faced the helpless Kyria, "The wise warrior knows when it is best to stop and perhaps fight again at more advantageous time."

Raven pressed her pinned captive harder into the wall eliciting a series of painful yelps from her then she eased up slightly. "Get the picture here?" she coolly said. Her anger rose again as she went on through clenched teeth, "So far we've been _nice_ about you attacking us. Stop this now or you're going to be a green stain on that wall! What in all the seven-levels of hell is going on here? We came here to maybe help you people and you _attacked_ us without reason! What is wrong with you! Are your AI-hybrid minds whacked or," Raven appraised Kyria's were-beast form, "is it from over breeding?" Raven nearly screamed at Kyria as she squeezed the black claw harder. Even from where Starfire was a few meters away she heard the cracking of ribs as Kyria screamed in agony.

Through all of this neither Starfire or Raven had noticed that the small pyramids on the central structure had opened exposing very large four-barreled guns that were inside of them. The three batteries in view of them fired a simultaneous blast that struck Raven's shield which in seconds started to strain from the onslaught as the heavy guns continued to pour out massive streams of charged plasma at it.

Raven had had it. This time she screamed in fury "**ENOUGH!**" as she released Kyria from her grip. She knew full well that the central building was probably the primary energy source or other critical function for the wonders of this place but dammit! They started this without warning or provocation and she and Star were going to end this NOW! As Kyria collapsed onto the floor Raven's eyes blazed blinding white as she momentarily gathered Power and then screaming "Azarath, METRION, **ZINTHOS!**" she released a tremendous black bolt of energy at the central building.

It never stood a chance. The ensuing blast not only took out the bothersome weapons, it tore apart the entire top section of the tower. The white dome on the top of it split and large pieces of it shattered like glass as the beam coming from the top of the dome began to sputter and then died as the dome partially fell in on itself. As the energy pouring out from it died the entire city dimmed and then flashed several times as its energy supply became unstable until it finally dimmed one last time and settled to a very low level sustained only by emergency reserves. Apparently the air vehicles were powered by the central source as well as by now all mechanical air traffic in the air rapidly settled to the ground, most fairly safely.

The attacks stopped. Starfire and glanced at Kyria still motionless on the floor then looked around. With her usual knack of understatement Starfire nodded her head towards the devastated central structure and commented "I believe that was as Res'al would say, 'A bit of overkill' was it not? You could have just destroyed the weapons."

"That was a faster solution" Raven sheepishly said. "It ended this mess didn't it."

Raven dropped her shield as Kyria groaned, gave a low growl and began moving on the floor where she lay. As they watched her struggle to get up on her hands and knees, Starfire kept her hands fully armed with starbolts at the ready. Kyria slowly looked up and saw the shattered central core and almost collapsed again but recovered with a whimper. Then she painfully turned her head and saw the now very much dimmed sky and crippled city. She turned more and saw Raven and Starfire without a scratch on them standing nearby watching her.

Kyria raised her head and painfully let out a long and baleful howl that echoed through the now almost silent city then slowly morphed back into her fully human form complete with her copper colored uniform again and sat back on her legs. The glow of energy faded from Starfire's hands as the two almost started to feel sorry for her. Almost.

"My people... It wasn't supposed to happen like this!" she wailed as she watched the fires caused by the flaming debris and crashed fighter craft sputter up the side of a far tower. She began crying, "We weren't going to hurt you if we could avoid it, after all you _were_ a part of Earth at one time, all we were going to do was just try and get a few genetic samples from you two to hopefully add some of your powers to ours. We _need_ them! We need more and stronger ones to defend ourselves from those who are causing the chaos on the surface!"

Both Starfire and Raven gave Kyria a disgusted look. "In that case, what you've done here today is even more... pointless," Raven said as she watched her slowly get up, wincing in pain as she tried to take a deep breath. "What... ow... ok, no more of those for a bit, I heal fast but you broke several ribs and that's going to take a few hours. What do you mean by pointless?"

Starfire continued with Raven's thoughts, "It is quite true" she told Kyria. "If the DNA of us was part of a plan to deal with what has driven you to this," Starfire gave a sweep of her arm towards the damaged city around them, "then it was a most bad plan."

Kyria spat out some blood. Even as hurt and defeated as she was she still angrily replied "A miscalculation and inconvenience, that's all this is. You know _nothing_ about what we can or cannot do or what happened here after the Rebirth. We have taken technologies and genetics from many aliens and their craft that invaded our space and turned it to our needs." She nodded towards the ruined central tower. "Look carefully at the structures you damaged."

Both Raven and Starfire turned a bit and looked then did a double take. As she turned more and looked at one of the bridges that connected the ring towers Starfire said, "Raven... The buildings are,"

"I see Star. They're healing themselves like that tower did."

As they watched, material seemed to flow up the outside of the distant towers and move to where the skybridges had been. It gathered there and began reaching out to the stubs on the other side which had already repaired themselves and waited to be joined to the other side. It looked like it would only be a matter of hours before the bridges would be intact again. The central structure repair was moving much slower probably due to the complexity and sheer mass of whatever had been destroyed by Ravens blast. Starfire dryly commented, "I am sorry Raven. Perhaps it was not 'The Overkill' after all." She mentally added _"I see that Kyria did not __exaggerate__ when she said she heals rapidly. She has stopped wincing when she talks."_

"_I noticed that too, I sense almost no pain from her mind. What have the humans done to themselves?"_

Kyria smirked and continued, "Almost infinitely massive distributed processing and nano-robotic based structures. For the sake for speed and efficiency key functions and facilities are centralized – like what you took out – but there are uncountable trillions of backup units ready to take over and sustain us until repairs are made. It is one of our proudest achievements harvested from a tiny unmanned alien spy ship we shot down that was composed entirely of microscopic robots. Each was incredibly complex but crudely large – we refined their tech and reduced its size a hundred-fold, the result," she again swept her arm towards the city, "is all you see around you. What you _have_ cost us is good people and genetic stock. Many of those pilots and warriors you fought were no doubt killed and not all may have set aside seed yet.

With the right genetics from you two," she also glanced around at the healing destruction around her then turned back to them, "with _your_ kind of powers – even a fraction of them – and our technology we could fight back when who or whatever is attacking Earth show themselves!"

Kyria scowled at Raven and Starfire. They were heartily chuckling to themselves and both slowly shaking their heads. "Should I tell her Raven or do you wish to?" Kyria's eyes almost looked like they could burn holes through them.

Raven sighed. "Fine. I will. Um, before you go doing anything else ah, unwise, as Star would put it, you should know something."

"What?" Kyria snapped.

"You can't have our DNA. Not because we wouldn't let you get it – and we wouldn't – but um, because you see..."

"We don't have any!" Starfire finished.

Kyria stared at them as if each had sprouted another head. "That is not possible! You're alive, our sensors confirmed that beyond doubt: You have body temperature, skeletal and organ structure, you have the right mass and no electronic activity so you aren't cyborgs or A-I's. You have brainwaves – highly odd ones, but nevertheless, you have them. Ergo, you are alive. If you are alive, then you have DNA. It's that simple."

Raven was getting fed up with her arrogance. "You have no idea how little you really know," she said in a low voice. "Earlier you said that Earth is not as xenophobic as it was when we were last here. We agree with you on that point... It's far worse! What happened to the 'Golden Age' of tolerance and understanding you spoke of? Just how does that fit with when you said that 'you've taken technologies and genetics from many aliens and their craft that invaded your space'? Those two statements don't exactly go together."

"How could it be any clearer?" Kyria sneered at them. "We have no conflicts among ourselves. The mutations-rate overwhelmed the barriers of race and creed. As those genetic gates were thrown down the human race truly mixed and as the mutations reinforced themselves and became the norm it has evolved into Homo-superior. Because of the mutations all have differing abilities that can be controlled at will and we have learned to use them well. In my case..." she stretched out an arm and looked at it as it morphed into its were-beast form, she flexed her clawed fingers a few times and then gave a wolfish smile as it shifted back into human form.

"In your case I have to assume that part of you came from some alien's pet it picked up from Rigel-4. That's were your were-bitch came from and they don't have technology beyond fire" Raven grumbled out. Kyria gave an evil smile, "It doesn't matter. It suits me just fine."

"_The bitch-form certainly does suit her!"_ sent Star and Raven gave a low chuckle as she got it. _"That it does my love."_ Raven sent back.

Kyria continued on, "The mindless breeding of hopeless masses of people has now been focused and controlled with a purpose – that of driving of us beyond Homo-superior. Together with the technology we have taken from the outsiders we have eliminated all physical needs of the human race – good basic food, water, and shelter are provided at no cost to anyone if they desire only that. We have taken on a partial A-I cortex that allows enhanced sensory abilities , reasoning, and faster reflexes than even our superior genetics can provide alone. Now all from Earth are accepted as equals for now there is but one race. _That_ is a Golden Age!"

Starfire and Raven stood in numb silence as she continued, "We stand as one world and one race, the HUMAN race! Our Rebirth from the ashes has shown us that it is our _destiny_ to survive and _**EVOLVE!**_" Kyria evangelically proclaimed.

Starfire and Raven faces were beginning to cloud with concern, they did not like what they were hearing at all. "And others do not also have a 'destiny'? They do not deserve also to survive? As you well know, Earth was not alone in its destruction and rebirth. Tens of thousands of races traveled through the fires of Trigon and were reborn by us." Starfire said.

Kyria haughtily replied "As long as they leave us alone, fine. If an Outsider enters our solar system much less Earthspace without our permission, then they belong to us to do with as we see fit. They do not have to come here but if they are foolish or unlucky enough to attempt it then they will play by _our_ rules. It is our right! If they resist – they die. We've disabled or destroyed many alien craft then dissected the remains of craft and crew to take and adapt what is useful to our needs."

Raven and Starfire exchanged a look of dismay. "That explains the tech we've seen here, most is way beyond what Earth could come up with on your own yet" Raven said. "Look, being good at figuring out how to use alien tech is the one thing we'll give you credit for, but _understanding_ what you've taken or the consequences of it is another matter. We're not _EVEN_ going to get into the bit about 'If they come here, then they belong to us' – that is so wrong on _so_ many levels that it's pointless to even discuss it as it is obvious that you will not listen."

Starfire piped in, "You say that Earth is under attack, that it is experiencing reality distortions caused by someone. I suspect that the 'Someone' is a race that you have abused in such a manner, no?"

Kyria glared at her for a moment then slightly cocked her head as if listening to something and oddly relaxed a bit. "We have no idea," she finally said. "We have never seen any of them or any ships. When the attacks begin phantom beings are seen appearing on the surface in large numbers and begin milling about, wherever they go things – change. Building disappear or are replaced by different ones. Anyone near them is changed to PMOH or completely vanish and yet animals and plants seem unharmed, if anything their numbers are increased almost like they were brought here. So far the attacks have lasted for only a few hours before they end. When they do, most of the buildings return to normal but the people do not and the new plants and other creatures stay. Lately, the attacks have changed in nature with large warp cubes dropping down from the sky. Whereas before it was just areas immediately around the phantoms that were effected, now entire large areas are."

"Excuse me?" Raven interrupted, "PMOH?"

"Pre-Mutant, Obsolete Human" Kyria explained. "They become a throwback without mutant or A-I enhancements. So far most have been able to be upgraded back to a reasonable level but it is not always successful, those unfortunate few are then removed from the gene pool and send to the surface into rehabilitation camps."

Raven's eyes opened wide. "Uh huh..." she said as he drifted over to Starfire. "Excuse us for a bit ok? We're just going to step out for a while to take a look around the rest of the planet to re-think about saving your sorry butts."

Quite unexpectedly Kyria gave them a malevolent look and slowly said, "Oh you're not going anywhere. I already told you – you came here uninvited so now you belong to us. One way or another you _are_ going to give us what we want."

10


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter-6**

_The price of arrogance_

"You have got to be kidding" Raven said in amazement as Kyria once again transformed to her green were-beast. "The kicking of the butts we gave earlier was not sufficient?" Star marveled as her hands and eyes lit up and fairly crackled with green energy. "Oh not at all. I told you that your small victory was simply due to a miscalculation. That is about to be corrected and I think that when it is over, this is going to be recorded as a very good day for the G.A.G."

"Raven, I think you have damaged her brain. If she believes that they... EEEP!" Starfire squealed as she was cut off by a hand of black energies that rose from beneath her and enveloped her. "Starfire!" Raven called. As she started to react she was suddenly surrounded and bound by a dozen thick deep-red glowing bands of energy inscribed with burning yellow glyphs that tightened until she was immobile. She attempted to phase through them and was surprised to find that the bands seemed to somehow interfere with the process and she remained solid. As she struggled she tried projecting an expanding shield around her and instantly the bands grew tighter and tighter until she felt nearly crushed. She released the shield and the bands released some of their pressure. She looked over at Starfire and saw that she was having as little success as she was: The dark energies had formed into a sphere that reflected all that she was throwing at it badly scorching her and singeing her hair. Her physically striking it accomplished nothing. She too had quickly stopped her attempts to escape.

Raven linked to Starfire and said, _"Just hold on and follow my lead Star. Let's play along here for now and let's see where this goes. We should have expected powers like these, even Brother Blood's cults had several members that could do this. Arrggg! Although, this lot are definitely a LOT more powerful!"_ She winced slightly in pain from the bands cutting into her arms and chose to shut down her pain receptors.

"_Then we can have the fun?"_

"_Of course my love – once we find out what they have in mind for us. It might be an interesting way to 'die' again."_

"_If so, they will be most surprised when it occurs."_ Starfire dryly added.

Two male figures that Raven and Starfire assumed were responsible for these different – and fairly effective – attacks floated up over the edge of the tower, one riding a glowing ring and the other simply levitating. As they drifted over next to Kyria, Raven and Starfire saw the one riding the ring was clad in a purple skin-tight uniform similar to Kyria's when she was in human form while the other was in a calf-length midnight-blue hooded cloak over a short black tunic. All that could be seen of the face under the hood was a pair of brightly glowing burning yellow eyes. As the other outfit left little to the imagination Starfire critically looked over the newcomer's physique, raised an eyebrow and commented aloud "I see that here they breed not only for fighting abilities." Her eyes fairly twinkled as she said, "That one is as hung a Glorfalger!"

Raven giggled, _"Fine time to think about that Star..."_

The two ignored Starfire's comments and joined Kyria. "It took you two long enough to get here!" she snarled. "Skarra, keep that retro-sphere as strong as possible. Ringer! - keep tight control on Raven." Kyria gave an evil smile. "She and I have a little unfinished business to take care of." As they closely watched and concentrated on their captives Kyria walked towards Raven saying "As I said before, earlier had we miscalculated your abilities. We had assumed that the old records were biased by the fact that when you were on Earth few humans had any enhanced abilities and so they had overrated your powers. I'm actually quite pleased to find that we were wrong – quite frankly the records did not do you two justice and that makes you all the more valuable to us. Now that we know better we've paid more attention to what was recorded as countering your powers.

While you're much stronger than the records told, I'm afraid you will find that _we_ are far beyond any of your former friends or foes during your time on Earth! Those bands binding you re-direct the zero-point energy around you and use it to create a stasis field so you cannot project your energies or phase-shift through them. As you've already seen, they also gather power directly from you and constrict in proportion to what you expend. Keep on fighting and they'll either crush you or if given a strong enough energy burst, slice right through you. As for Starfire, a simple retro-reflective force shield ball – any significant energies inside are reflected back onto their source. I can assure you that the power needed to break it from the inside would also vaporize her in the process. Beyond that, I'm sure the two hundred G.A.G. soldiers and Special Psi-ops such as Skarra and Ringer here that are on their way up should put things nicely in our favor. So, as I said before, you are _ours!_

Kyria brought her fanged jaws inches away from Raven's face and gave a deafening roar as flecks of spit flew into Raven's face. "Glaaah!" Raven coughed as she wrinkled her nose. "Smells like some bitch has been licking her butt recently. Ever hear of mints?"

"_That should put her over the edge..."_ Raven sent to Star with a mental wink.

It did. Enraged, Kyria roared again as she gave Raven a vicious slash across her ribs with one clawed hand shredding part of her cape and left side of her black unitard as her claws put five deep gashes in her arm, side and breast. As Raven gave a scream of pain Kyria smiled, backed away slightly and smugly said, "I owed you that. No one before has hurt me like you did, never even close to it. Earlier you said something about 'doing things the hard way', well..." she extended a single clawed finger and with it's razor sharp tip lightly traced a line down Raven's cheek and neck smirking as Raven tried to squirm away. "My dears, you killed a lot of good people and this is just the beginning of what we are going to do. You are going to be taken apart cell by cell until we find wha..." Kyria stopped mid-sentence and gaped in disbelief as she looked closer at Raven's wounds. Like the gills of a fish Raven's arm and side had five deep slits in them leading well into her partly exposed left breast. Her grey-skinned flesh was clearly parted to the bone but...

"What trickery is this!" Kyria bellowed.

"Arrgghhhh!" Raven again convincingly screamed and writhed as Kyria ran a claw deeper through one of the gashes in Raven's side. She inspected and sniffed the clean dry claw that emerged and in stark astonishment said, "No blood? But... you're _alive!_ You're Humanoid! Flesh and bone and brain, our sensors left no doubt of that, hell, you have _scent!_ I smell you!" Her eyes widened in alarm as she backed further away, _"Just what are you?_"

For the first time in her long life Kyria felt cold fear as she saw that both Starfire and a grimly wounded-looking Raven now were giving Kyria and her companions a pair of very wicked grins. She was starting to get the feeling that this might not be such a good day after all...

"_Please may I tell her Raven? Oh, most please of please?"_

"_Oh go ahead. Just make it good."_

Given their apparently untenable positions, a disquietingly cheerful Starfire told them, "Did we not say that we have none of the 'DNA' for which you seek? We are far more than what you think you see and your devices detect. What we have become and what you see and sense are very different things. We..." Starfire glanced over at Raven for a second and continued on, "or at least _I_, am sorry that you did not learn from your actions the first time. A second lesson seems most needed. If you wish to avoid further deaths of your people and damage to your city that it _cannot_ repair I suggest that you release us **NOW**."

"Commander," Ringer said, "they're bluffing! It's impossible for them to escape much less hurt us, anything that could break their bonds will destroy them as well!"

"_He's right you know Star. Too bad it hasn't occurred to them that 'death' might not be a problem to us_" Raven sent Star as she allowed a slight release of energy and gaged the reaction of her bonds to it as they tightened. _"I know what I'm going to do for the show, how about you Star?"_

"_Um, I assume that for this little demonstration the Pre-Phoenix limitation is off, is it not?"_

"_Hello! Slashes in my side flapping in the breeze here! I'm already into Phoenix mode."_

"_Then, given the nature of my cage I can think of only one idea. It should be quite the blast, no?"_

"_I'll go first to set the stage. After that wait a few seconds for the proper effect then have at it."_

Floating outside of time and space between what is and isn't the disembodied loci of Res'al and Phoenix had of course been keenly watching her avatars on Earth. "It seems that you two have got yourselves in a rather interesting situation. Just how far do you intend to go to prove your point to them – take out the entire city?" Res'al asked.

Phoenix gave a wry mental grin, "If need be but I think killing ourselves and that contingent already in the tower should do it if we make it impressive enough. Taking out mostly only that central area and structures should suffice I think. Those folks seem pretty well prepared for ah, troublesome visitors, like they've done this more than a few time before so hopefully they had the sense to get non-combatants out of the area.

If we can get it through their thick skulls that we are not their lab rats to study and dissect they might accept our help. I'm not sure why but I feel that Kyria is part of the key to what happened there. When I asked her about the Azar shield-wall encasing the city I sensed alarm from deep inside of the A-I part of her mind and nothing from the human part. _Something_ has happened to her and we don't think she – the human/mutant part of her – is really in control anymore. If we can disable or at least isolate the A-I part of her brain without ruining her there is a chance we can get to the bottom of this.

It's their use of Azar tech that has us most worried. I can understand them finding those damn Mu transport orbs that if they were thrown clear of the destruction of Azarath, the question is: How the hell did they learn about other Azar technologies much less gain the ability to create and activate any of it?"

Res'al was puzzled. "Tech is tech isn't it? You know some humans are exceptionally bright and their leaps of insight to fill in missing pieces of information can be astounding. If they find enough bits why shouldn't they be able to figure it out?"

Phoenix gave a mental sigh. "First of all, there shouldn't _be_ any Azar tech that survived and second, you know damn well that it takes an ascended mind to create and activate it. The technology simply creates a focus point and relies on the ascended mind's ability to warp space and matter. Like you said at the beginning of all this, that ability should not arise again for at least ten's of thousand's of more years and yet they – or least some of them – have it _now_. Even their forced genetics couldn't have brought that about so soon. The orbs are another story, any intelligent being can use them once they know how they work. It's what made them so useful to the Mu and their trade partners."

"But the orbs survived your destroying Azarath. Why shouldn't anything else make it through?"

"The orbs were placed in a vault deep within Azarath that was heavily shielded with multiple dimensional barriers and shield-walls to block out the Hand. Since the orbs weren't sucked into the Void with the rest of Azarath those shields would have easily protected them from the cataclysm so they could pass into realspace. The problem is, if they weren't drawn into the Void the shields should have remained active and the orbs should still be safely locked away inside of the vault."

Res'al thought for a bit. "How were those barriers generated? Outside of the vault or were the generators also within the shields?" he asked.

"Both are actually right. The vault itself was the source of the barriers and shields and of course tapped into the zero-point energy fields across several dimensions which it warped to form the barriers. Several of them also extended outside of it to seal it away from anybody who might be under the influence of the Hand or random stupidity and trying to access the orbs. Once they were raised there was no way in and of course, no way out. As long as Earth's multiverse had any energy left in it the vault should have remained sealed forever." Phoenix replied.

Phoenix got the distinct impression of Res'al's non-existent eyes opening wide. "Uh oh... I think I see a flaw in that. What would happen if the vault was temporarily removed from the multiverse, even for an instant?" he asked.

"They would collapse until they were again reset. Why? Like I said, it would take... " Then it hit Phoenix what Res'al was thinking of: "Oh no... _Please_ no! When we re-created the Galaxy after Trigon destroyed it... During the rebirth for a time everything in it _was_ outside of the multiverse! _We_ opened the door and started all of this!" she cried.

Res'al's thoughts to Phoenix took on a grave tone. "If that's what really happened then it's the price of your kindness in restoring Life to your galaxy. It would be a prime example of why the rest of the Eternals and any other non-corporeal ascended beings shouldn't intervene in the events of physical life – even the best of intentions will _always_ have unforeseen and often dire consequences. Either accept that fact or leave Life alone!"

This upset Phoenix even more. "Oh gee, thanks you bastard. That just makes us feel _so_ much better!" she angrily retorted.

Res'al understood her feelings, as Raven and Starfire it seemed that everything they touched had become cursed and suffered because of what they were. Of course the culmination of that was Trigon being released for the last time into their universe and his draining all Lifeforce from their galaxy. Once they had joined into Phoenix and finally destroyed Trigon they had thought that all that was finally over. Then this happens... Res'al knew that her earlier remark about Kali the Destroyer of Worlds must be seeming to ring all too true to them right now.

"You know," Res'al said, "Before you go on whipping yourselves, has it occurred to you that there is a better answer to what happened?"

Res'al sensed that Phoenix's mood lifted slightly, "Such as..." she hopefully queried.

"Such as your restoring your home galaxy to _as it was_ before Trigon's final assault not being what released the Mu orbs from their vault. Think about it: If the vault had been sealed before you two restored it then it would have still been sealed after the rebirth as well. The flash of non-time and non-existence the galaxy went through is irrelevant, it's the nature of what you did."

As she realized what Res'al said was true her thoughts became confused, "But that means that the barriers had been broken to begin with and that just brings us back to the question of how!"

"All I can come up with is that it happened as Azarath was sucked into the Void at the end of your third battle with Trigon. As the vault approached the Void's event horizon it's possible that it grazed the Void close enough to bring down the shields before it was slung past and the shields protected the vault long enough that it was somehow prevented from being drawn in before the tear into the Void collapsed. Once Azarath was gone anything that remained where it had been such as you two and the rest of the Titans – and the vault with the Mu orbs in it – dropped into realspace." Res'al replied.

That put Phoenix back into a funk. "So technically... we are still the cause of this mess. Great. We accidentally ripped open a portal to the Void that annihilates Azarath and _that_ opened the door for the Hand by freeing the Mu orbs. Isn't that just lovely."

Res'al slowly shook his non-existent head and if Phoenix had one he would have gently knocked on it. "Hellooo! Starfire, are you sure you're in there with Raven? She needs a little help with a bit less gloomy view from you here! There's more to it than that."

A slight shift in personality came over Phoenix and her mood lifted considerably, "Thank you, we did need to see through the others eyes. I believe we understand what you mean: These events were set into motion because of the Trigon and his choosing Azarath as his point of entry into our universe and his battle ground. Because of his choice we were a part of what has happened, we were the ones that ripped apart space and time but... we did _NOT_ cause it to be. What was done was done to defeat Trigon and that is all! It is unfortunate that this has happened as a result but it was not intended.

It was... the no-win situation. If Raven and I had not created the tear in space-time leading to the Void Raven's father would have won and began his destruction of all life in our realm only 500 years sooner – 500 years which may as well have been forever since we would have been destroyed before becoming Phoenix. It was... the balance, either our Galaxy and eventually entire Universe falls to the Trigon or" Phoenix momentarily shifted her view back to Earth, "this happens."

Another personality shift and Phoenix was more in balance but still rather dark again. "So this is what you meant by 'The Price'. Either uncounted trillions upon trillions die or Earth's meager billions face the fire. It _was_ the right choice but that does not make it any easier to accept."

Phoenix gave a contemptuous snort, " Worse, to us as Eternals existing outside of time and space, I supposed it really shouldn't matter to us right? No matter what happens while their multiverse lives, it's all pointless in the end isn't it? Earths multiverse _will_ eventually die while we continue beyond forever. That's pretty depressing... We're starting to understand all too well why the other Eternals stay in the quantum mists."

"My turn to say it, Thank You! The light's on and finally someone's home! Do you also now understand why this is the one time, well..." Res'al mind softly caressed Phoenix's, "ok, the second time, that I'd ever again consider me or you seriously interacting with the flow of Life?"

Phoenix cautiously answered, "Knowing you, to teach us a much needed lesson?"

Res'al hesitated before answering, "Yesssss... and no. When joined with you I know your desires far too well and the ones to 'Do Good' are the most dangerous. Aside from becoming Phoenix, as you just said the consequences of anything you did as your former selves ultimately were to our viewpoint I suppose, well... inconsequential. They were limited only to the planetary or at worse galactic scale. But now as an Eternal, those desires not only can, but _will_ effect all creation in a universe. Get carried away and it may change all of them that exist throughout the quantum mists at that moment.

That lesson you may have learned, but perhaps _too_ well. You said that all that happens in the physical realms was rather pointless because in the end it is as if nothing ever happened all. All who lived and died, the great and the small, the good and the bad and all they had done – reduced to quantum particles to be recycled anew. You are oh so wrong! To _us_ perhaps it has no meaning because we exist outside of those realms but to ethereal Life itself – and we _are_ a part of Life – it _does_ have meaning.

Res'al looked deep into Phoenix as he finished, "I prefer to think that as the quantum bubbles containing universes collapse back into the mists, _something_ of those who were in it diffuses into it. That essence carries on to influence the next creations that appear. To me the ultimate question is the same one that rings through all self-aware races I've ever encountered – Why?"

Res'al kept a few more thoughts to himself for now, "Oh my Love, if you only knew how many universes perished the instant before that little jewel of _your_ multiverse sprang into being. I knew the beings they contained and at their end most who made it that far were prime examples of Life at its best. Inquisitive and gentle, brilliant manipulators of the gross and the sublime. To the last of them, even those not so... nice, when their universes finally collapsed or dissipated back into the eternal mists they all held one belief – that something of themselves would continue on. I think it has and that you are the sum of all they were, they were the spark that awoke you from the sleep of creation. You my eternal Phoenix arose from their ashes.

Phoenix sensed a cloud over Res'al's thoughts but assumed it was just from what was happening and their discussion. "On Earth that's called Karma" she said. "And that applies to this situation, how?"

Res'al snapped back into focus, "It applies here because while there may be another price to pay for fixing it, this is a MAJOR break in What Should Be – one created because of the events that led to your creation. Right now the time-lines of Earth are being re-written and not just branching off on a new track. We've seen future Earths before in its various dimensions and now we can't – we're seeing several variants that are in flux from this point on. Frankly, I've never seen anything like it before in the hundreds of universes I've watched come and go. It is unique as was your creation, the two _must_ be connected.

Since the time-lines are already being scrambled, I can't see anything that you do or don't do making things any worse for Earth and hopefully you may be able to set things back on a more normal track whatever that may turn out to be."

Phoenix pulled back slightly and regarded Res'al. "You're winging it again aren't you? Damn you're good at sounding like you know just what to do! You know, one of these times it's going to turn out that you got it all wrong but hey, what do you care? You and the rest of the Eternals that even care can just sit back here in the mists and go 'Oh well he got it wrong. Poof goes another universe. Ho hum.' Well guess what: You ARE WRONG! Maybe we only think this way because we were once a part of it but it _does_ matter what happens in them. It MUST!"

Phoenix stopped and could sense Res'al was hurt. "You have no idea..." He gathered himself inward before continuing, "You're right about the others not caring. Aside from brief interest when you became one of us they don't even acknowledge that these Universes around us contain Life. As you said and have seen for yourself as we spanned the eons together, to an Eternal they come and go all the time. When you were physical beings, did you pay attention and care about snowflakes floating around you in winter? Of course not! While each may be a wonder of beauty they are also – common. They are ephemeral and disappear to no ones' regret. To the other Eternals that is all these Universes are: Snowflakes drifting in the Mists of Eternity. Why _should_ they care?

But - you have no idea just how wrong you are about _me_. I alone chose to look deeply into what they contained and appreciate their possibilities. I _have_ made mistakes before and will always carry the burden of knowing their aftermath – but I also learned from them."

Res'al broadened his focus and broadcast to all within the Mists of Eternity, "**Of course because they choose to never look into these little bubbles of life that appear here, the other Eternals will never face that problem **_**will you**_**? You choose to never having to face the guilt of having guided untold numbers of ****sentient**** beings to their doom – or, knowing the joy of having helped a race if only for a brief time to us, achieve ****ascension**."

Res'al in vain waited for a reply from the other Eternals. Nothing.

Not at all surprised he focused back only to Phoenix. "They are content to just exist in the Mists and believe that we are all that truly _is_ because only _we_ have always been and always will be while all else fades away.

_I_ chose differently. I chose to join with Life, to learn from it and yes, at times succumbed to the desire to interfere with its progress. I accept responsibility for all that happens when I do and I admit I've been lucky so far that never have the benefits been less than the causalities are worth but no matter what – there are _always_ casualties. I have also learned to be very very selective in what I do. A nudge here, plant an idea there."

"We know your 'Do too much or too little etc. but if you do things just right, they'll never be sure you did anything at all' speech." Phoenix dryly said.

Res'al glared at her. "You are still missing the point! The creation or awakening of you – I doubt we'll ever really know which it was – is the most drastic thing I have ever done interacting with Life. I was DAMN lucky it has turned out so well and this mess on Earth is so far the only ill effect of it. Perhaps you might, but never again will I do such a thing."

Res'al brightened a little, gave Phoenix a mental smile and again softly stroked her mind. "You were my greatest risk – and are my greatest joy. Even if the worst happens to Earth and it ends as a burnt cinder, or even if your Multiverse itself implodes, to gain you makes it all and more well worth it."

Phoenix was deeply moved as they sensed that Res'al had just opened the door to the one tiny fragment of his vast mind that had been closed to her. "I said it before and we'll say it again, DAMN you're good!" Phoenix began to merge with Res'al. As her thoughts turned more sultry she stopped and had one more question, "That just leaves how did Earth learn to make and use Azar technologies? If the Hand are behind this why haven't they come through?"

"I think you just answered your own question. The Hand _are_ behind it and are the ones who selectively fed Azar knowledge to Kyria and her ilk but maybe their goals or needs have changed from what the Azar knew of."

"Changed?" Phoenix said in surprise, "Changed how?"

" Well... The Azar evolved and ascended into non-physical beings didn't they? When Raven and Star were talking in the alien tower on Earth you said that the Hand were 'Evil Azar', on-par with your Azar. Is there any reason to assume that the Hand haven't ascended to a non-physical plane as well? Just because they were viewed as 'Evil' by your people is no reason they couldn't ascend."

"!!! That's it!" Phoenix said as she flashed the thoughts she and Res'al had just shared to her two avatars on Earth and saw them grin as they now had a much better idea of the situation. "Oh you are _sooo _going to get it now..." she slyly said as she jumped his non-bones.

A flayed but very confident Raven addressed her three foes, "Well Kyria, are you ready to see just how badly you've miscalculated again? _My_ little demonstration is just a show of REAL power for you and your two friends before they die. On the other hand, Starfire's _will_ be the death of them and possibly your precious little city." Raven paused and cocked her head to look around slightly before continuing, "Given that your G.A.G. think we are such an important find, I assume that we are being monitored in other areas and cities?"

Kyria weakly nodded agreement. "Sight and sound?" Raven asked. Kyria again nodded, she was hoping that before she died this was going to hurt less than their previous 'lesson'.

"Good." She called out to Starfire, "Let's see, in our little games in BRCM I've been eviscerated and eaten alive by mammoth slugworts, vaporised and blown to bits by numerous beam and projectile weapons, crushed by boulders and even had a house fall on me but never cleanly sliced into sections, right?"

"You are correct my Love."

"Excellent. Then this ought to be an interesting way to die... Huhhhee YAAA!" she screamed she released a tremendous burst of energy which the glowing bands binding her absorbed and reacted to. In an instant they contracted to zero inside diameter and Raven was cleanly sliced into thirteen sections which fell to the floor with several wet thuds like so much butchered meat.

Kyria's and her companion's jaws dropped as in seconds the Raven bits seemed to melt away into a gray fog which then quickly dissipated to nothing. Moments later she and her two allies literally jumped as a thunderous voice of the now disembodied Raven spoke, **"Aw, did we forget to tell you that we are no longer corporeal beings and really don't have bodies anymore? Oops. Well, the fun and games are over folks. We came here for a reason and we are tired of your perverse race's xenophobia and ****megalomania**** interfering with our mission. There is NOTHING you can do to stop us so I suggest your either help us to help you or leave us alone while we are here. If you insist on going it alone then I suggest you give us wide berth from now on because we'll kill every one of you that gets in our way if that's what it takes to save Earth. But for now we give you just one more lesson in Power – LEARN FROM IT THIS TIME!"**

Suddenly Raven created an new avatar of herself right behind Kyria and again made her jump as she whispered in her ear, "Say good-by to your city and friends bitch."

As she threw up a dark shield ball around Kyria and herself she called to the still encased Starfire, "Your turn."

In an instant Starfire's hands and eyes were ablaze with brilliant green energies as she gathered more and more power. She brought her hands close together then opened them again and between them a solid ball of energy grew which rapidly enveloped her and almost filled the sphere encasing her.

Raven looked to the one called Skarra who was still trying to control the caged Starfire and saw he was shaking violently from the effort as he strained to contain the mounting energies. His hood had fallen back revealing a rather handsome young man who didn't look more than 20 years old. She thought to herself, _"No matter what, I've got to admire his loyalty and talent, it's a pity he has to die. That ring-trick hunk in the skin-suit with the huge __wang __took off in terror as soon as he saw me appear next to Kyria. Wimp."_

Starfire sent a quick message to Raven, _"This Skarra is surprisingly strong! I fear that is going to take more Power than I intended to use. I feel sorry for this city but as you said, they started this battle and WE shall finish it!"_ With that Starfire's energy instantly doubled, and even after passing through Skarra's dark sphere and Raven's shield both she and Kyria had to close their eyes and turn their heads against the blinding light.

Raven grew concerned, _"This is getting out of hand! We need Kyria alive, not atomized."_ she thought as she drastically increased the strength of the shield around her and Kyria to withstand what she knew was coming next. All went black as the shield now blocked all but the tiniest portion of visible light.

Already blinded Skarra screamed in anguish as his flesh began to blister and smoke. Veins were bulging in his burnt forehead, neck and bare extended arms as he tried to keep control. Starfire swept her arms wide shouting "THIS... ENDS... **NOW!**" as she released her built up energy: To those on the outer edges of the city who saw it, it looked as though a green sun had formed in the center of their city then in less than a second all went dark as their eyes were burnt bloody by the intense radiations. In a way they were fortunate that there was barely time for the idea that something was terribly wrong to register before the tremendous blast wave hit, shredding them and all that was already burning and melting from the stellar radiant heat of Starfire's energy blast. The cities inhabitants who were closer-in never even sensed what hit them; Tick – one instant they and their city were there. Tock – the next instant they were superheated plasma hotter than the center of a star.

The insanely bright green ball of energy expanded to several kilometers across vaporising all it touched. As it reached to top of the the underground city's 'sky' it encountered the already weakened Azar shield wall that encased the city. In a tremendous secondary blast of energies almost as powerful as Starfire's original the two forces briefly battled until with a fantastic actinic flash covering the entire sky the Azar force dome was breached. With the shield wall gone Starfire's plasma ball quickly penetrated the few kilometers of rock covering the city before it broke through to the surface and finally began to dissipate.

The mountains outside of Jump City witnessed a single brilliant green flash followed by a short-lived volcanic eruption as the tremendous heat and pressure that had built up within the immense cavern that held Cyber City-1 found release. An incredible rush of superheated air ripped apart the tear Starfire had made and blasted away much of what had covered the underground city.

As if Fate herself relished in making things worse, Cyber City-1 had been created under the mountain slopes that ringed Jump City and this unfortunate choice of location directed the full force of the blast in its direction. Several cubic kilometers of rock and earth now rushed towards it in a roiling dark-gray blistering-hot cloud of pulverized rock and ash that was lit up every few seconds by tremendous searing bolts of lightning. Somewhat diminished it reached the city within minutes but still shattered outlying buildings and heavily damaged the rest before it rolled out over the water not quite making it to the ocean before stopping and settling into the bay.

As the tornado-force winds from the blast died down a fine powder of rock and ash began to fall, the City by the Bay took on a twisted winter-wonderland look as all was quickly covered with several inches of the white powder.

An eerie silence fell as if the wounded Earth itself was holding its breath.

9


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter-7**

_An unfortunate turn of events_

Kyria was transfixed in terror at what she was witnessing. She knew full well what Skarra was capable of and he was nearing the breaking point while somewhere in that blinding sphere of energy, Starfire seemed to be not even trying! Suddenly the sphere's intensity _doubled_ and she had to turn her head away. An odd sense of static buzzed through her brain followed by a metallic taste in her mouth. Both soon faded away and were replaced by an odd sense of clarity...

She thought to herself: _"Raven and Starfire were right – we really didn't have the slightest clue as to what these two really were or were capable of. Nothing Earth had ever found or seized gave even the slightest hint of beings with such powers! Even the Others had never said anything... Raven and Starfire are treating this as if it were simply a game to them."_ As she knew what had to be the end of her and her city approached she allowed herself two last thoughts, _"Skarra my son, today you have proven yourself beyond any warrior mothers hopes! I hope the others on Earth take Raven's message to heart and work with them – these two __are_ _the only hope Earth has to stop what is happening on the surface."_

Then, ever pragmatic, she grimly added _"Right. Like that's really going to happen..."_

Raven had been listening to Kyria's thoughts as Starfire began to gather energy and was startled to learn that Skarra was her son. That partly explained why he had remained when the other fled. Quickly Raven touched his mind. As she did she sensed no malice or fear – only utmost duty to do what he believed needed to be done and devotion to his mother. That made up Raven's mind. As Starfire began to say her final words Raven reached out a black claw of Power and seized Skarra. As she drew him into the sphere shielding her and Kyria she healed his eyes and the worst of his radiation damage enough to survive for now. What would happen to him later... that depended on what he and his his mother did once this episode was over.

The instant Raven pulled Skarra out of the fight the cage holding Starfire ruptured and her energy was released.

Even Raven was stunned at what Starfire had unleashed. A maelstrom of Power equal to a good sized anti-matter weapon expanded outward as its radiant energies caused the air itself outside of Raven's shield to burn. Within seconds the tremendous ball of plasma had expanded several kilometers in diameter disintegrating all it touched. Raven adjusted her shield dome to dimly allow Kyria and herself to see what was happening. Her part done, Starfire re-created her avatar and joined Kyria and Raven within her shield. She was surprised to find an unconscious and still smoking Skarra lying at Kyria's feet. Raven saw Starfire's puzzled look at Skarra being with them, shrugged her shoulders and simply said "I'll explain later" as she returned to watching the spectacle around them.

More than once for a diversion, as Phoenix both Raven and Starfire had passed through the interiors of several stars so being surrounded by seething plasma million's of degrees hot was nothing new to them. What _was_ new was the sight of what it did as it encountered once solid matter. In the blink of an eye buildings and people simply violently evaporated and added more mass to the superheated sphere as it grew.

Kyria saw the start of her city's death when she was suddenly dimly aware of an unharmed Starfire appearing next to Raven and looking down at the floor. Kyria followed her gaze and nearly fainted in shock, Skarra was _alive!_ He was terribly burnt – his skin was a mass of blisters and some was even charred – but he was still alive. For whatever unknown reason Raven had spared him and had brought him to her. She morphed to her human-form as she fell to her knees beside him and with tears streaming from her eyes cried over and over to Raven "Thank you! Oh thank you thank you thank you!" She was vaguely aware of violent shaking and a constant muffled deep rumble as she picked up and cradled the still breathing but not moving head of her son as all around them Cyber City-1 ceased to exist.

Eventually the violence was over. With them still enclosed within her shield Raven raised the tiny bit of the city that still existed beneath their feet into the open sky above the mountainside and with it moved them all to the higher edge of the crater that once was Cyber City-1. As the remnant of floor Kyria and Skarra were on touched the ground Raven released her shield. Much to their surprise, what was a solid floor immediately turned into a fine dark metallic-blue powder that their feet sank into. Still cradling her son, Kyria watched as both Raven and Starfire rose into the air and floated over to the nearby craters edge. They looked down, then out over the crater as the sun started to rise over the ruins of what once was Jump City.

Starfire put a hand to her mouth in horror then hung her head on Raven's shoulder. "I truly did not mean for _this_ to happen!" she cried. Raven put her arms around her and held her tight, "I know my love, I know." Though it almost hurt to do so, Raven tried to be the optimistic one for once to try and cheer Starfire up a little. "This certainly isn't going to plan – not that we had one to begin with, but... we've done worse and everything worked out in the end didn't it? Earth is pretty screwed-up right now and as Res'al said, there _are_ going to be casualties in the process of fixing it. We have to accept that." Raven looked down at the angry red molten floor of what was a thriving city, "All we can hope is there won't be many more unnecessary ones before this mission is done."

Starfire sighed, "I too wish that. The worst is that unlike before, those whom we have killed here today... they are not coming back. There will not be the 'reset' as you called it."

"Not this time." Raven said as she released her, "even if it were possible I don't think we would dare do it." She again looked out over the swath of destruction they had unleashed. "As bad as this is, to undo it would simply ripple through time and create another disaster because we did. Res'al is right. Once the time lines are again stable, we need to leave them alone. No matter how this turns out, no matter how many die this is what must be."

They hadn't noticed that Kyria had wandered over next to them and even though her gaze was locked on what remained of her city and the other, she had caught most of their conversation. She turned to them in shock and puzzlement. "You call this" she swept her arm toward the devastation, "acceptable casualties? There were over half a million people in Cyber City-1 and another quarter-million in suspension in Jump City. That anyone could call their deaths 'acceptable' is beyond conscience! You treat this as some kind of game! – _just what are you two?_"

Starfire and Raven both angrily spun around with eyes ablaze to face Kyria and speaking as one, they merged together. _**"We are the Two-who-are-One! We have passed through the fires of Life and Creation itself and emerged from them born anew as **_**PHOENIX!**_**"**_ As they spoke their true name they burst into their gigantic blazing green bird avatar which rose into the sky hundreds of meters high and spread its glorious wings of green fire more hundreds of meters across and releasing an ear-shattering screech. With fiery blue-white eyes it stared down upon a terrified Kyria and just as quickly as it had arisen again shrank down to human form again.

"_**This is NO game to us!" **_they shouted as Phoenix took on her final human avatar form with eyes still ablaze in anger. _**"We may be immortal and no longer part of any universe but unlike Humans that does NOT mean that we do not care about what happens to others we encounter. We warned you to leave us be but no, you just HAD to try and prove that Humans are somehow superior to anyone else and have the right to do whatever you please to anyone who came by! Starfire may have unleashed the energies that caused this death and destruction but YOU and your people are the ones who set those events into motion. You dare speak of conscience? It is YOUR people who are the ones who thought it an 'acceptable risk' to not listen to us. It is YOUR arrogance that has reaped this reward!"**_

Their eyes dimmed and anger subsided as Phoenix sensed the confusion within Kyria as she was trying to piece things together. They probed deeper and were stunned to find no trace of the cold A-I presence that was there before. "What are you thinking about right now? I sense that you are... different" she asked her as Phoenix blurred and again split back into the forms of Starfire and Raven to put Kyria back on more familiar ground.

Still quite stunned by what she had just witnessed Kyria nervously replied "I'm... I'm not exactly sure. Part of me is still screaming 'THEY ARE DANGEROUS – KILL THEM! FIGHT! BITE! CLAW AND REND!' and yet... I know Starfire was right. I'm not sure _why_ we continued the fight when we did. The wise thing would have been to fall back and at least regroup and re-think things before continuing. The rare times we had come across anything or anyone powerful enough to give us as much trouble as you two did in the first battle we always gave ground, licked our wounds and swallowed a little of our pride for awhile because there are other ways of getting what we wanted.

But _this_ time... Something kept driving me on. What or why, I just don't know!"

Far far away with glassy unblinking stares several dozen pairs of eyes around the rim of a large circular chamber watched a holo projection in the center of the room as scenes of Cyber City-1's destruction followed by those of Phoenix's transformations were replayed over and over. In another dimension the beings who controlled those eyes coldly commented on what was being relayed to them through the unmoving corpse-like humans in the chamber.

A disembodied mind spoke, _"Most impressive._ _So, a local non-corporeal being has taken interest in this insignificant race." _A second mind added, _"Quite a powerful one at that."_ A long list of numeric data quickly scrolled by as it continued,_ "All of the storage units in the surface city are permanently off-line because of the destruction of Cyber City-1's power core. Most of the stock they held have already expired and the few remaining will die very soon. Question is, is this one of the First One's or one of their meddlesome lackeys such as the Azar?"_

A third joined in as Phoenix transforming in front of Kyria was replayed, _"Is only this one fixed outside remote available ? It would be advisable to follow these two." _More information flashed by and the first added, _"No other exterior remotes survived the blast and aerial units will not arrive for another hour."_

" _A pity. An interesting if somewhat flamboyant choice of avatar this 'Phoenix' has chosen. It belies tremendous Powers which may be a threat to us. This calls for a rethinking of all that is known about the Rebirth event – perhaps a more literal interpretation is needed."_ the third mind concluded.

A short and coldly calculated discussion took place among them and others before it was decided that this 'Phoenix' was not a First One. The deciding factor was that as far as they knew, long long ago even before the creation of the Hand – and the Azar – the First One's gave up all interest in the affairs of the physical realms or those ascended from them. As long as the Universe and its dimensions existed the First One's were content to leave it on its own. Even when the Hand had battled with the Azar so long ago the First One's had done nothing to aid the Azar against them. Nonetheless the Azar had won and managed to seal their realm against the Hand although at great cost to their race and Earth's. Until now that is, the door had once again been opened and the Hand intended to make full use of it.

The third mind resumed, _"It knows of Azar technology and seemed to take great offense at the Humans use of it. Whatever this creature is, it could present a problem to us if commander Kyria tells it/them what she knows or worse – allows it into her mind. Her AI has been destroyed by the EMP of that beings energy blast and she is free of our control. Something must be done!"_

More discussions took place until at last the first mind again commanded attention and spoke. _"It is agreed then. The destruction of the human storage banks in the surface city present only a minor setback to our plans, with quickened culling of the herd we will soon make up for their loss and be able to advance our timetable. For now, it is still too soon for us to come through so we must delay this creature until we are ready. The AI within commander Kyria's son was damaged but has now fully repaired itself . It is best that this 'Skarra' be used to silence her. She alone carries full knowledge of us and our plans for her realm locked deep within her subconscious memories, without her this 'Phoenix' will be at great disadvantage and it will give us the time we need to finish our preparations..."_

Soon regional commanders around the globe received new and somewhat puzzling orders from Earth's Grand Council to increase the number of prime-grade mutants – Earth's most powerful – to be placed into suspension each day to the maximum possible. Few questioned the reasons given and all complied without hesitation.

The council of minds continued a little while longer._"The preparations have been accelerated as requested. Has progress been made as to the cause of the reality distortions?"_

"_Yes, they are Temporal distortions caused by rebels from Earth's future. Expected results would be to stop or disrupt our entry into this realm. The fools do not seem to understand that if they succeed then they themselves would also cease to be! No matter, analysis to block them is almost complete."_

"_Excellent."_

Kyria walked carefully to the craters edge and looked again at the destruction laid out below then looked back at Raven and Starfire and sighed. "Just look at them," she thought to herself, "untouched by any of this and that – thing – they transformed into... Incredible."

She turned to face them, "If it's any consolation to either of you, seeing what you're capable of so far I can tell you that it _would_ have come to something like this sooner or later. It just ended up being sooner. Maybe a display like you just gave me might have made us reconsider but I doubt even _that_ would have stopped us. I do remember one thing very clearly and it terrifies me more than seeing this destruction: _I_ was the one who summoned the Psi-ops and gave the orders to continue the battle. At the time every part of my mind screamed to restrain or destroy you two as quickly as possible. What terrifies me about it is that _I don't know why!_ It made no tactical sense! Your previous battle showed more power and abilities than any of our people posses."

A low moan from Skarra broke their talk. Kyria rushed over to him as he began to move. He rolled over on his side as Kyria knelt to help him. As Skarra slowly and painfully shook his head not yet realizing where they were he groaned through pain clenched teeth, "What... what happened?" He dimly saw a familiar face near him that slowly came into focus. "Mother! We're alive? How... how did we win? Such Power! Never had I ever dreamed any being could summon so much energy!How on Earth did she do it?" He looked up at Kyria's face and saw in it a confusion of pain and sadness over the destruction of the two cities mixed with joy at him being alive. Kyria grabbed and held him close. Weeping tears of sorrow and joy she sobbed, "No my son. No, we didn't win... we lost very very badly. We never stood a chance."

Skarra was confused. As the rest of the world came back into focus Skarra wildly looked around and saw that they were on the surface at the head of a wide valley of dusty white that ran to a ruined city in the distance. Then he saw Raven and Starfire slowly floating towards them. He tried to break from Kyria and get to his feet as he shouted, "They've found us! Run!"

Kyria held him back saying "No, no! It's alright! They _saved_ us!" Now utterly confused Skarra stopped struggling and collapsed back down to the ground which suddenly was just fine with him. His head felt like it had burst apart and things were swimming again. As a gray fog again started in his mind he seemed to hear his mother in the distance saying something... "_They saved us. And they are our only hope of saving Earth."_ The fog in his mind grew thicker as he mumbled "It figures. Oh bloody hell, I hope someone can..." then all went dark.

Kyria brushed the singed stubble of his blond hair and gently pressed both her hands to his head. A soft blue aura grew around them and spread over Skarra's body as Kyria intensely concentrated for several minutes. As Raven and Starfire watched they saw his charred and blistered skin quickly heal and rightly assumed that his innards were doing the same. Finally the glow faded and Kyria sat back on her legs looking very tired as she rubbed both sides of her head. "He'll probably be out for a few hours but he'll be alright now. He came a hair's breadth away from frying his brain trying to contain that energy you unleashed. Frankly I was amazed that he survived his injuries at all until while healing him I sensed that much had already been done. I assume that we have you to thank for that?"

Raven raised an eyebrow. "Yes. I sensed no evil or viscous intent in him, only duty and devotion – he's a credit to you. Sooo... you're a healer, as well as a were-beast hybrid?" she asked her. When we were last here on Earth it was unheard of for a mutant to have more than one major ability.

"No, I'm not and it's still pretty much the same now. The genetics of mutation always focus themselves on only one aspect of the person. If they happen at all, multiple abilities are at best always incidental to the primary. I can't help most people but the ability that allows my transformation is the same that mends me so quickly and that portion _can_ be applied to those genetically linked to me."

"Like your son" Raven said.

"Yes, like my son." Kyria saw Starfire giving her a curious look. "What's bothering you?" she asked.

"Um, you seem remarkably, ah... calm, considering that we have done considerable damage to two of your cities and your offspring. It is most unlike your previous behavior," Starfire cautiously replied.

Kyria gave both Raven and Starfire a long, hard look before answering with a cold and almost evilly gleeful voice. "Oh I'm _far_ from calm about it. Part of me wants to tear you limb from limb. But then you'd probably find that 'interesting' wouldn't you? You'd simply re-animate or reform or whatever it is you two do and we'd be right back to square one again. More to the point, it wouldn't help me – or you – find out what's happening here, would it?" Kyria looked down at her son then slowly stood up. "Think what you will but my concern is and always be the safety of Earth. Starfire was right. She may have destroyed these cities but I pushed her to do it. What I can't fathom is why I did it – at least so soon. I remember..." she put a hand to her head as she tried to concentrate then gave a look of frustration, "no, it's gone. It's as if someone else was in my head with me but now there is only their echoes."

Kyria shook her head and dusted herself off. "We need to get out of this area and under cover. I expect that pretty soon there will be recon bots along with containment teams showing up and they will only cause more trouble before you end up annihilating them. I know where we can go if you help me carry Skarra."

She started to bend over to pickup her son and was startled as a black disk appeared under them and raised them both off of the ground. Kyria looked over at Raven who just shrugged her shoulders and said "Beats you carrying him and since you can't fly it's easier than walking. Just try to stay in the middle of it." The disk carrying Kyria and her son rose a few meters into the air and as she and Starfire followed alongside Raven asked "So, where to and how far is it?"

The sun was just fully showing over the low hills of the bays headlands as they rose into the sky but instead of going in the direction Kyria had said Raven first guided them over the center of the immense crater that once held Cyber City-1 and stopped.

Both Starfire and Kyria gave a puzzled look at Raven who was staring down into the crater. Suddenly a bright light appeared that rushed up towards them. Unconcerned, Raven held out her hands and they soon saw that the light was the Mu transport orb speeding towards them at what Kyria thought was a rather alarming rate. Just before reaching them it slowed and then softly rested itself in Raven's hands.

Kyria was flabbergasted. She looked down at the rubble still glowing bright orange-hot at the bottom of the crater then back to the orb. "That thing survived? It was almost at the center of the plasma ball and should have been reduce to atoms!" she exclaimed.

Raven shook her head slowly and sighed. Almost as if explaining to a child, with a resigned expression she told her, "Ok. _One_ more time. How about paying attention this time alright?

Of course it survived. Because each orb exists in several different dimensions at the same time, unless they are _all_ taken out at the same time nothing in this Multiverse can harm them. Don't you think that instead of isolating them in a Vault the Azar would have destroyed them if they were able to? Sheesh. We said it before and I guess I have to say it again a little clearer – somehow your people have stumbled upon technology and forces far beyond your comprehension. Until now you've been lucky that nothing else your people have uh, 'acquired', has been anywhere near this dangerous. But these," Raven hefted the orb in her hand, "_these_ have have teeth along with a mean venom and woman, your race has been bitten and is hurtling headlong to its death! They just don't know it yet."

Kyria, Starfire and Raven stared at the orb as she held it. Within it clouds of colors and light slowly swirled and pulsed in a slow mesmerizing rhythm that seemed to try to draw you in for closer inspection. Briefly entranced by the display Kyria turned her gaze away from it and shook her head as if to clear it. She asked "If they can't be destroyed, what do you plan to do with it?"

In answer, the orb again took on a black sheen and floated from Raven's hand. One of the blood red gemstones slung around Raven's waist lit up with a dull glow and as the orb floated towards it the gem suddenly gave a brilliant red flash and the orb was gone. "For now, simply put it somewhere safe."

Kyria gave them both a blank stare. "Safe? Safe where?" she asked.

Starfire pointed to the gem on Raven's belt. "Safe within Raven's holding gem. It is an accessible – place – that has been removed from normal space and capable of carrying a great many things." She turned to Raven and asked "I assume that in there it will be unable to be used by anyone?"

Raven cocked her head for a second in thought then slowly answered "Welllll, I can't see how. Within it is a bubble in the Void filled with a temporal and spatial stasis field, isolated from everything except the gem which is the only gateway to and from it. In many ways, whatever is placed within ceases to exist until it is removed. Since the gateway only works from this side of the gem, we should be safe enough.

With that out of the way we can get going now." Raven turned to Kyria, "How long do you figure before your cohorts get here?" she crisply asked.

Kyria flashed her a defiant look and shot back, "Oh, maybe another hour or so. The nearest major base is several hundred kilometers away from here."

Kyria guided them to an area just outside of the ruined city near the hideous alien tower they had entered at the start of all this. As they approached it Starfire and Raven were taken aback to find the tower intact and completely free of any damage – even the pulverized rock dust that covered everything else seemed to have been repelled from its surface. Buildings around the structure were heavily damaged and like the rest of the surrounding area were buried under a heavy layer of ash and yet true to the rest of its perverse nature, amid the devastation it alone stood there actually glinting in the early morning sun.

Kyria noted their reaction to the sight. As Raven set her and Skarra on the ground near it she said "You seem surprised to find it unharmed. You shouldn't be – this facility was where we perfected the nano-tech that forms the basis of our current society." She nodded to the surrounding area as she went on, "The campus around here was where most of the aliens that worked with us lived." Kyria glanced at the building, cringed, and then turned away at the grotesque friezes and statues that covered its outside. "Trust me, if there was anyway to get rid of or change this – thing – we would have done it long ago. Before the last of the aliens left Earth they somehow locked its structure to remain like this forever - even if it had been damaged it would have completely healed itself long before we got here."

Kyria placed her hand on her hips and in a rather annoyed tone asked again, "Come on, really. What is about you aliens and leaving nasty parting gifts?"

Raven gave her a dark look and fired back, "Actually, they are usually rather nice. Hmm, could it just be that Humans deserved a few well thought-out reminders?"

Starfire saw Kyria growing angry and hurriedly floated between the two of them. "Is it safe to remain outside near this place?" Starfire asked to change the subject.

Kyria let her anger go. "It should be" she replied. "Our people don't like coming here and the primary monitors for this entire area were routed through the complex where we first met. With that gone only the backups might be working and none of them cover this area." The only thing we might have to worry about is aerial surveillance." She looked up and then with a shudder, looked again at the wall next to them. "I suppose that if we go into the alcoves leading to the entrances and stay out of sight we should be okay for a while. What do you two intend to do next?"

"Wellll, I think that the first thing is to check this place out. The people that created this..." Raven slowly ran her hand over a nearby carving, "effect – went through a lot of trouble to make a point about something. The least we can do is see what the idea they're trying to get across is."

Leaving Kyria to take care of her son both she and Starfire soared up and began looking at the unpleasant details of the carved walls. Some of the horrific images seemed to portray scenes of different creatures suffering through various torturous mutations ranging from sprouting multiple limbs, heads and other physical parts to what looked like spirits entering and leaving their bodies while other sections were depictions of unspeakable cruelty, torture and sacrifice being inflicted upon wholesome looking hapless victims of the mutated horrors.

As they progressed along the first wall more and more concern began to show itself on their faces until they finally as one they gasped in the realization that they were reading a story elaborately told through the terribly disturbing carvings. They saw that there was a pattern to the horror show and that the walls of each side were independent portions of the story as told by different races. Aside from the general topic of cruelty and pain there was one and only one image common to each portion of the story being depicted – that of a hand with an all-seeing eye in its palm. High above all the other figures it seemed to gaze down upon all else.

Starfire and Raven were discussing the implications of what they gathered to be the general message the creators of this place had tried to get across when they heard the raised voices of Skarra and Kyria arguing in the distance. They both drifted back to where he and Kyria were and interrupted what seemed to be a highly animated discussion, "...and I still don't understand how you can even consider helping them! Gods among us mother, they atomized the city!"

"Gods among us indeed, my son. The legends about them and what they did are true! You haven't seen what they are or can do, only the aftermath of their retribution against our actions. There is no turning them from their single-minded pursuit to find out what has happened here and it's obvious that any who try will be swept aside like so much dust. Their powers are far beyond even the..." Kyria saw the two floating back towards them and lowered her voice, "They're back. We'll discuss this later but for now, please don't fight them." Skarra glared at her but nodded his head in agreement.

Starfire of course heard every word and relayed her thoughts on the matter to Raven. _"Skarra is most upset over our actions and as we feared, Kyria is NOT to be trusted. She knows more about what is happening here than she is revealing to us. While her AI may be now off-line, she still forms the plans within plans."_

"_That doesn't surprise me one bit Star. She schemes so much I doubt she even knows her own mind. Well, she knows the score and I think at least for now while she may not help us she won't interfere either."_

Raven and Starfire touched down next to Kyria and her son. Starfire brightly addressed Skarra, "I am most pleased that you have not been permanently damaged by your attempt to contain me. Your mothers healing has worked well."

Skarra bristled. "Yes it has. Except for a monster headache I'm as good as new. Pity she can't do the same for those who were in the cities you destroyed" he sarcastically said. Kyria kicked him hard in the foot. "Ow!" He angrily spun around to face her. "Dammit mother! While I might not have the power to fight them, I will NOT kiss their asses either! We will figure this out on our own without the help of Outsiders. The council has already told us that they have plans to plot the distortions so our people can be removed from the effected areas before they appear."

Starfire fairly burned at his tirade. "YOU UNGRATEFUL CHLORBAG!" she yelled as she flew at him and pinned him to a wall high off of the ground by the neck. "WE CAME HERE TO HELP EARTH AND ALL YOU HAVE DONE IS TRY TO CAPTURE OR DESTROY US."

"Glaaagh...You're...ack... damn right we have!" Skarra gagged out. "The council knows all about you now and will find a way to drive you two from this sacred Earth or better yet, destroy you! The others have told them what you are." Kyria gasped as Starfire raised a hand alight with green energy to strike him when Raven gently enclosed it within a dark sphere and pulled the two of them back to the ground.

A black band of energy covered Skarra's mouth as a gag. "That make twice I've saved your sorry butt from her" Raven coldly snapped at Skarra. "There _won't_ be a third time. You will either be more civil the next time you speak or I will rip you apart myself. We are in _no_ mood to put up with this crap. Understand?" Skarra's eyes burned with fury in response. "I _said_, UNDERSTAND?"

Skarra gave a single curt nod and Raven removed his gag. The instant she did Skarra again angrily addressed his mother, "I understand all too well! See how arrogant they are mother? They dare to think that they alone know what is best for Earth! Damn them and all other aliens!" Kyria's eyes opened wide with alarm at his continued outburst, "No my son! Please STOP this before it is too late! You don't understand! They truly can..."

Ravens eyes flared to brilliant white as Skarra cut Kyria short. "Traitor! Mother, have you forgotten those others you discovered so many years ago? They aided us in removing the other Outsiders and will help us again to stop these changes that are happening. These two treat us as insignificant dust beneath their feet while the others have given us Power and have promised us greatness and rule over this Galaxy once it is time!" As he continued his rant he shot a massive bolt of brilliant blue energy that forked towards Raven, Starfire, and – Kyria. To his disbelief it simply splashed harmlessly off of a force wall that sprang up in front of them. "These two..."

Skarra never finished his sentence as Raven raised her left arm and with a single hand of black energy pulled him from the ground spread-eagled into the air. Without a word Raven snapped her finger wide and as Kyria cried, "NO! Please!" Skarra simply came apart in a gory cloud of flesh and bone. Raven then clenched her hand tight and the shredded remains of Skarra's body collapsed into an ever-shrinking ball of black fury which rapidly shrank to a pinpoint then vanished with a simple muted 'pop'. Stunned with grief Kyria collapsed to the ground sobbing "Why? Why? You didn't have to... He didn't know..."

Raven coldly replied "he was warned and purposely chose to ignore the consequences of it. Worse, I looked into his mind – he was determined to do everything he could to block or stop us and that is a distraction we cannot permit. Even though I am certain he knew _exactly_ what he was doing, Kyria, his attack on us – and _you_ – was not his idea. He was not the same as he was when I first saved him. The AI had taken full control of him and he didn't resist its influence at all. In fact he welcomed it thinking that somehow it would aid him against us because Skarra felt that his death would turn you against us. He needed to learn a lesson in the reality of this situation." What Raven didn't explicitly say was that Skarra had tried to kill Kyria. _"Why? What does she know that is so important?"_ she thought to herself.

Kyria looked up and screamed, "A LESSON! _A LESSON_? Skarra is DEAD! How does that _teach_ him anything? If anything he proved his points against you two far too well." Kyria morphed into her were-beast form as she stood up and began backing away. "I may not be able to fight you but I am NOT staying here! If there is no stopping you two I'm at least getting the hell away from you!" she snarled.

As Kyria began to sprint away Starfire swooped over to block her path, "I am very sorry, but you cannot leave just now" she sweetly said. As Kyria frantically tried to dodge, Starfire jinked to stay a little in front of her at every turn forcing her back to where Raven still stood. With Starfire skillfully matching Kyria's every move she continued, "We have seen what is told on these walls. We believe we know what the previous residents of this facility were trying to say, but have – questions – that we believe you can answer. Please... to begin with, who are these 'Others' that Skarra spoke of?"

After a minute or so of trying to get away Kyria finally stopped and with wild eyes gave a snort of disbelief and angrily stammered, "I... You two are incredible!!! How can you even think... _YOU KILLED MY SON IN FRONT OF ME _and actually expect me to... to still _help_ you? Are you two... whatever you are... insane?"

Raven drifted over to Kyria. "At times, possibly. I suppose it depends on your point of view." Starfire giggled for a moment as Raven carried on. "Point is, you don't have a choice. You _are_ going to tell us what you know about whatever happened in this place, what the AI implants are, when they were introduced to Earth, and as Starfire asked who these 'Others' are."

Kyria was furious, "Go back to whatever Hell you came from!" she screamed as she brandished her claws. "Skarra is dead and I will rip out my own throat before I help you!"

Raven looked at Starfire and she looked back at her, _" Raven, I believe she would truly do it..."_

"_I don't doubt it either. That son of this bitch! Who or whatever is behind those AI implants knew exactly what they were doing when they set him off. While we could still extract the information from her mind before it fully shuts down, I _do_ feel a little sorry for her. Of course I could just go in and take it but we'd loose all context of what we discover. I suppose the only way to negate their move is to take this little issue out of the picture..."_

"_Um, since it would be a re-write, could we not leave out the implant?"_

"_Good question..."_

Raven looked hard at Kyria and carefully asked, "Fine. Answer this one question and you can leave if you still want to." Kyria just glared at the two of them but said nothing. After a few moments of this Raven shrugged and went on, "These AI implants in your heads: Do they hold any personality and growth memories data or are they just augments?"

Kyria silently and slowly cocked her wolfish head to one side and puzzled for a bit over this odd question – it was not at all what she had expected. Finally she carefully replied, "They are just augments and data links. Why do you want to know?"

"_Glorious! That is a start!" _Starfire sent to Raven.

"_Mmm ..."_

Kyria then surprised the two of them by adding, "If you're thinking of somehow removing them from everybody – you can't. After being implanted for about a year the brain relies too much on it for sensory processing and in most people those parts of the brain begin to atrophy from lack of use. Remove the AI's from an adult and you get someone totally isolated from the world, what we call Locked-In Syndrome."

Starfire began to say, "But, does not your AI no longer function! How is it that..." Starfire's eyes opened wide as it hit her. "Your healing abilities! They keep your mind intact, no?"

Mocking Starfire's manner of speech Kyria shot back, "They keep my mind intact, yes. It is the same for all meta-morphs because of the cellular re-arrangement and regeneration involved in shape-shifting. You still have not said why you want to know."

With a resigned sigh Raven replied, "Since you're rightly upset over me killing Skarra I suppose there is only one solution to..."

Cutting her off, Kyria spat out "_UPSET? ... __**UPSET!!!"**_

Raven's eyes flashed red. "For at least a few moments, _**SHUT UP**_!" she angrily said. As she and Starfire both closed their eyes and merged together Kyria began backing away again. When as Phoenix they again opened their blazing green eyes Kyria began to tremble as they thundered, _**"AS WE WERE SAYING... SINCE KILLING YOUR SON – EVEN THOUGH HE DESERVED IT AND **_**WAS**_** TRYING TO KILL YOU – HAS CAUSED A BIT OF A PROBLEM, THERE SEEMS TO BE ONLY **__**ONE SOLUTION. BELIEVE US OR NOT, WE ARE SORRY IT HAD TO BE DONE, BUT... THINGS DO NOT HAVE TO STAY AS THEY ARE. **_

**_HOPEFULLY THIS WILL CONVINCE YOU TO HELP US. KNOW THAT WE DO THIS _ONLY_ FOR YOU. IT WILL __NOT__ BE DONE FOR ANYONE ELSE!"_**

As they finished speaking there was a soft 'pop' next to Kyria. She turned in surprise and there stood Skarra looking quite bewildered but otherwise none the worse for wear. _**"Now will you help us?"**_ Phoenix more softly thundered.

Totally confused, an apparently intact Skarra asked "Mother?.. What just happened?" to which Kyria replied quite appropriately: She promptly fainted.

11


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter-8**

_Kyria's Memories_

Phoenix gave a bemused look at Kyria sprawled on the ground and deadpanned _"Well that went well..."_ She blurred briefly and split once again into Raven and Starfire. Skarra had barely cried out "Mother!" and fallen to one knee by Kyria's side when he froze in place. "I felt that now is not the time to deal with his distractions and stopped his Time for now" Starfire dryly commented.

Raven appraised the situation and began saying "Humph. Couldn't agree more. Well, since she's ah, in a 'co-operative' state, I suppose we could take um, advantage of her an..." when Starfire sternly cut her off. "While I agree even in this were-beast form she has the 'great bod' I hardly think that this is the time for the enjoying of her! I am surprised that you even... OWW!" Raven gave her a not-so playful smack on the head along with a murderous look. "Interesting idea, but that's NOT what I was going to say! Sheesh."

Starfire was still rubbing her head as Raven went on, " I _was_" - another dark look - "going to say that this would be an excellent time to enter her mind and see what she knows" and as she said it, Raven's eyes went black and she crept into Kyria's unconscious mind.

"Oh. Um, ah... yes... that sounds the much better idea" Star meekly replied.

Kyria was drifting in a timeless comfortable cottony fog when a Voice softly made itself known to her followed by what looked like a distant pair of burning black eyes. At first she didn't know what to make of it. She fought hard to remember... something, something very important to her. _"Hello there,"_ the Voice soothingly said in a low gravelly tone._ "Do you know what just happened?"_

Something about that Voice bothered her – it was familiar and yet, why did the image of a tremendous bird made of blazing green energies come to mind? Scattered and fragmented memories of recent battles and her son began coming to her when suddenly they crystallized into perfect clarity for a moment: Phoenix! The creature was a being that called itself 'Phoenix' and it had... Skarra! Her son had been killed by that creature! A cloud of confusion descended into her mind again. No, that wasn't right either because she also knew that he was still alive...

The Voice then became two that began talking to itself – or was it themselves?, _"I believe she is still confused from the fainting"_ a lighter sounding part of it said.

The grimmer half replied _"Easily corrected by triggering a little adrenaline. That should clear her mind but I am still going to keep her under"_. Kyria felt a change come over her and then as if a dark curtain was parted, she remembered it all: Raven, Starfire, and her battles with them that ended in her twin-cities being destroyed – the underground one vaporised in a release of energy from the one called 'Starfire' and the other city on the surface almost leveled by the ensuing blast. She remembered Raven and Starfire becoming a crheature called Phoenix and it referring to themselves as 'The Two-Who-are-One'. A red-anger grew within her as that was later followed by the horrific memory of her seeing Raven's powers violently rip her son into a cloud of gore. Finally, shortly after witnessing Skarra's messy death, the last thing she remembered was Skarra being restored to life by Phoenix.

"_It was at this point that you collapsed"_ the brighter sounding half of the Voice commented. "Hmm. Sounds like it was a perfectly sensible thing to do" said Kyria. "Ah, just to keep things straight – just _who_ am I talking to? Raven I assume? The Voice giggled for second before confusingly replying, _"Stop it Star! Yes, it's mostly me though we are never just ourselves."_

Raven sensed a nagging concern entering Kyria's mind as Kyria asked, "so what now? Mind probe? You two are ruthless enough to do it." Memories of interrogations she had witnessed performed by her own people flooded her mind. They had been far from pleasant. From what she had seen and knew of it, deep telepathic probes ripped through the victims mind like punching a hole in a bucket. All thoughts and memories were dumped in a flood that left psychological and physical damage that at best, could last for years and more often was permanent. Kyria suddenly had the peculiar sense of the disembodied voice giving itself a questioning look. "Good trick considering there's only one pair of eyes" she thought to herself, "These women are _weird!"_

The Voice became rather haughty,_"Weird? An interesting if rather general assessment. giggle Thanks. You have NO idea just how weird_._ As for ruthless – you are one to speak. When we first met, your plans for us certainly weren't – nice. We were only trying to find out what happened – correction, what IS happening here and yet just for being on Earth, YOU wanted to take us apart at the cellular level to try and copy our powers!"_

"Point taken" Kyria replied. "But you're still going to drain my brain."

"_Oh no no no, nothing of that sort! More of a simple replay. We see your memories of how your people conduct deep probes and that was just pure brutality! Even at your levels of ability your people didn't have to do that! They did it solely to be expedient and to intimidate. They know that what happens in those sessions quickly becomes common knowledge and the fear it inspires makes it easier to break future victims – so again we say, you dare called US ruthless!_"

Kyria sensed the mood behind the Voice became much more serious as it went on, _"Look, you seem to be central to what is happening here and this is the best way for us to get to the bottom of things. Who or whatever is in control of Earth manipulated your son Skarra to kill you and would seem to be worried about what you may know. If you allow it, we can have your memories replay themselves as if in a dream. We would be able to see, hear, feel, and know things exactly as they happened."_

For reasons she couldn't quite put her finger on Kyria was uncomfortable with that idea. She vaguely felt she knew what they were after and yet she didn't understand why it mattered so much to them. After all, she _was _the one who discovered the transport orbs that Raven and Starfire were so concerned about. Problem was, she didn't exactly feel certain about everything that happened during that fateful day and the weeks that followed. She remembered it all crystal clear and yet – it just never felt quite _right_.

Well, even though Raven had killed her son these two had also restored him to her. While she still wasn't sure what to make of this 'Two-Who-Are-One', that act alone proved that she – they – _whatever – _they were capable of mercy even though they acted very far removed from the concerns of mortals. Granted, they only did it so Kyria would cooperate but still – Skarra was alive again. She made up her mind.

"Fine. You can ask me about it once I wake up. I'll tell you all I know about those damn orbs you seem so worried about."

The eyes in the mists of her mind sighed, _"We're sure you would, but using speech and talking about it would take too long, this way will only take a few minutes once we start. However, there's one slight problem – there is hole in your mind." _Kyria listened in puzzled disbelief as the Eyes went on,_ "Your memories have been tampered with. A sizable stretch has been erased and other areas associated with that have been modified to cover the gap. Your memories about this matter are not to be trusted."_

A hole in her mind? What in all creation was these creatures talking about... then it hit her – that was it! Ever since she came across the orbs she had had this nagging feeling that something important about that day and the weeks after it was – missing. "I assume that you can do something about that?"

"_Certainly. This discussion would be pointless if we couldn't. Without physically damaging the brain memories can never be truly erased, only suppressed or modified. Traces still remain of the originals that we will find and untangle. Be assured it will not be the mental rape your people use!"_

Kyria took a deep mental breath and with a determined resolve said. "Do it." The eyes in the dark flashed her the thought _"so it begins.."_

Flight lieutenant colonel Kyria was piloting her tiny stiletto shaped Rapier on a rather mundane cleanup mission outside of the moon's orbit near Lagrange-point 2. While she was a powerful meta-morph which normally meant ground troops assignment to take maximum advantage of her physical traits, early in her training she had also shown an ace level of skill as a mecha pilot along with extraordinary tactical and leadership skills. She later proved it by personally taking out over a dozen raider ships during a single mission two years ago and that feat had earned her her current rank. Things had been quiet for the past year and she had asked to be reassigned to this duty as soon as she heard of it. She found that zipping around through the debris fields near Earthspace dodging rocks in her very agile Rapier and blasting them could almost be as exhilarating as combat was. Almost.

It seemed that Earth's Grand Council had finally decided to do something about the rubble left behind by a cataclysmic event several centuries ago that nearly destroyed Earths' moon. Just what exactly happened was never determined beyond the fact that a small band of Earth Heroes that included a mutant, a cyborg, and two aliens were involved. When pressed for information about the event the group insisted that they had battled an 'extra-dimensional being of pure evil' just outside of the moon's orbit and it had been defeated by the same blast that had shattered the moon. Of course no evidence to support their claim had ever been found and, apparently, substantial damage to areas around their battles was commonplace. Granted, shattering the Moon was their most extreme level of 'Protecting the Earth' to date and was certainly pushing things but still, since they _were_ a band of 'Heroes' their explanation blindly was accepted by most people

What _was_ certain is that over a quarter of the moon had been blasted into space by whatever they had done and for the past 2 months it had been the job of her squadron to clear this area of as much of the rubble as possible. Personally she didn't understand why this hadn't been done decades ago when the area between Earth and the moon was cleared so communication satellites could once again be safely placed into orbit, but no matter. Now clearing the area outside of the moons orbit and other space projects had been given top priority because a new sensor array was to be put in place to monitor the outer solar system for any incoming alien craft so here she was busting rocks.

Ever since Earth had rescinded it's ban on alien craft entering its solar system over the years many had arrived unannounced and Earth's Grand Council finally felt it had enough. While most had peaceably passed through there had been trouble with raiders as well – Kyria took a grim satisfaction in knowing that since the battle that confirmed her Ace status no raiders or their scouts had been reported any closer than several light-years from Earth. No matter. She knew that sooner or later after licking their wounds and rebuilding their fleet they would return. The new sensor array was supposed to pick up the space-time ripples caused by FTL craft clear out to the furthest edges of the Oort cloud which would give Earth ample time to decide what to do about them.

Kyria smiled at the irony of it: Ever since Earth had slowly opened relations with the rest of the galaxy it had tremendously benefited from the exchange of knowledge. It's people had made incredible leaps in applying technologies learned from the few alien groups who had setup campuses on Earth that frankly astonished the aliens. Several years ago she once came across a group of scientists and overheard a bit of their conversation before they had become aware of her and changed the subject: It seemed that they were awestruck at how Humans had an uncanny knack of very quickly taking ideas presented to them far beyond what any of the other races had previously thought possible.

Their main concern now was that the Humans had recently been introduced to very advanced Link technology by an obscure race from just outside the Galactic Rim. Throughout Earth's technological history Humans had tried to integrate Man/Machine interaction with what most of the group called quite primitive and uninspired results. Now this previously unknown race had given them a detailed sample of the tech used for direct one-on-one mind link to data and machine control where the person was not just linked to a machine as an outside controlling force but actually _became the machine_.

This was when Kyria literally pricked up her ears by partly morphing to her were-form to hear better: Given Earths rather violent history, more a few of the scientists thought it was frightening. What if Humans were allowed to take this technology to it's logical end – total AI integration? Some of the group were sure that like all the other races that had reached that point, they would quickly learn the folly and weaknesses of it and quickly put a stop to the research or like the few who didn't – would annihilate themselves. The uncertain ones pointed out that all those other races had gotten there on their own without outside help. This unknown rogue race had literally handed the tech to the Humans. Who knew what such a tech-leap would produce from their fairly violent race?

At this point the group had spotted Kyria and changed the subject before they quickly broke up and moved away leaving her slightly curious about what they meant by 'Total AI Integration'. She already carried the recently introduced Link within herself and didn't understand their concern. Kyria thought it was quite handy: Instant voice and visual communications along with data display and in her case as a fighter pilot, ship systems and weapons control all just by consciously thinking about it. By adjusting the activation thresholds as desired it could even be turned off at will although she had never heard of anyone who did that. Set to maximum, the advantage it gave her in combat was stunning and to her it seemed as if she was flying naked through space with a gods-eye view of the area around her, firing bolts of destruction from her fingertips and dealing death to her enemies like some quaint superhero from the vids. At the time, she passed-off the aliens discussion as the typical arrogance she had seen so much of from them and shortly forgot all about the incident.

For now, her job was S&S – sweep & shatter and for safety the Link's thresholds were set fairly low. While not quite the naked warrior, she was still highly attuned to what was around her ship. As some chunks of rock the size of office blocks showed on her scanners she vectored towards them and opened fire with scarcely a thought. Four high-energy negative plasma bolts blazed ahead of her tiny craft and struck the rocks, encased them in a black sheen which then imploded shattering them to fine dust. Again she gave a little grin, _"They are certainly right about us applying their tech in novel way"_ she though to herself. "_These negative energy weapons were a spinoff from anti-grav tech brought to Earth just a few years ago and look what we came up with from that!" _From what she had heard here and there Earth's new twist on that tech was already changing the face of battlefields across the galaxy. Kyria gave a wry smile as she thought, _"Combined with the Link, maybe they _were_ becoming Superheroes"_.

Her part with this group of rocks was done and through her Link she sent out a message, "Bob, cleanup sector 10-10-5 point 2-1." Fifty kilometers away inside a 'Hoover', one of her teammates acknowledged the request and moved in towards the area to finish the job. No one seemed to know just how that type of ship got its name but the Hoover was an immense ship with one purpose for now: Collection and re-direction of orbital debris after it had been shattered to a suitable size. Force-walls projected out from it in a broad cone that entrapped the dust created from the imploded debris and channeled it through a powerful charged plasma beam which accelerated it to relativistic speeds. The entrapped particle beam was then directed in a safe direction off the orbital plane into deep space. Not surprisingly, it also was phenomenally useful as a weapon when not used for mundane space cleanup.

Kyria resumed her sweeps and after several hours of jinking around boulders and blasting them, towards the end of the mission something strange appeared on her scanners. Five hundred kilometers away the forward locater showed a large circular area that was unusually empty. Just over 20 kilometers in diameter it was devoid of _any_ debris. At normal field size even rocks the size of a small pebble would show up and yet that area was empty while the region surrounding it was positively littered with rocks and boulders of all sizes. She narrowed the scanner to show higher detail in the region when suddenly for just a second a huge object appeared in the exact center and then winked out again. Kyria instantly raised her link to a higher level – still nothing. She was starting to think it was just a sensor glitch when thirty seconds later it was back and again, just as rapidly disappeared. She raise her link to maximum, what she liked to call her Naked Joy mode, to fully integrate herself with her Rapier and barely – just barely – made out a roughly spherical object in the center emitting a tightly shaped beam of considerable energy. This beam is what she had stumbled upon by chance, just a few degrees off from her current axis and she'd never have seen it at all.

Kyria slowed herself/Rapier almost to a stop and watched this for several cycles before she got an idea. She swung herself in a large arc around the anomaly and was not surprised to see it stayed the same shape and size. The anomaly was a sphere exactly 20,460 meters in diameter with only the singular object inside of it, other than that, not even dust. Her repeated scans eventually established that whatever was in the center was exactly ten times smaller than the emptiness surrounding it. Curiously the scans also showed that debris moving toward it was deflected off course, often quite abruptly meaning – a force shield! What ever was in the the center was shielded! This had to be checked out but first things first.

Kyria contacted lunar command about her find and sent them all the data she had collected so far and waited for further instructions. They replied to maintain her position and keep relaying her scans to them until they got back to her. Knowing how long it took for things to move through command bureaucracy she reduced her Link back to minimal and let her ship handle the mundane job of sensor data collection by itself. It didn't surprise her that it took well over an hour for them to finally send her new instructions. What _did_ surprise her was that they wanted her to move in and investigate what was in the center of the cleared region. Whatever was in the center was huge – over two kilometers across and when fully visible to scans showed a thick crust surrounding a tremendous power source within it.

She reminded them that multi-thousand ton boulders moving at very respectable speeds were being deflected by the force bubble surrounding the object and asked just how was she supposed to get her tiny ship through it. They only replied that powered craft might respond to it differently. _"Where the hell did they come up with _that_ idea!"_ she growled to herself as she went back to Naked-mode – this time far from happy, and dutifully fired the engines to slowly begin advancing towards the anomaly. As she headed in she spotted a house sized boulder heading almost directly towards it and decided to follow it in to see how it responded. She boosted power to the engines to reach it and then swung around to stay behind it as long as she could.

50 kilometers out from the object the huge space rock began changing trajectory as it began to encounter the deflection field and by 40km it was already on course to miss the anomaly by a wide margin. Kyria became uneasy as her scanners then reported something totally unexpected - once the rock was set to clear the object its course stopped changing! Instead of being deflected even more as it was heading deeper into edges of the field it now acted as if the field had no effect – or as if the field was being actively controlled. "_So... something or someone is monitoring and modulating the field. I wonder what other surprises you have for me" _she thought to herself. She relayed her concern to lunar command and was rather annoyed when they dismissed the information as 'expected'. _"EXPECTED!"_ she raged. _"How in the Seven Hells Above can ANYTHING about this be expected!"_ she spat out over the link.

Kyria caught part of the controller at lunar command talking to someone else before giving her a brief message switch from voice-only to full imagery as well and to hold on. There was a long silence then an all too familiar voice and sneering face replaced the person she had been talking to. Kyria cringed as soon as she saw and heard it. "Colonel Matrix, this is Counselor Havitall and I have taken direct command of this mission." The woman on the vid screen leaned back in her chair, and appraised what she was receiving through her end of the Link. "Mmm, you did always look rather stunning in naked-mode..." The woman gave her lips a small lick, and Kyria reminded herself to change her transmitted avatar from her human shape to were-form as soon as this was over. "_Very_ nice. So _you_ are the one who may have found what could be our greatest prize. Well, we could have done far worse. Never the less, all information about artifacts such as this is classified and not any of your concern. Continue on with your mission."

Kyria's mind flashed back to the last time the two of them had crossed paths: Havitall was in charge of a black-ops unit that specialized in acquiring what some felt were 'critical' alien technologies that were being unfairly withheld from Earth's researchers. Most often these acquisitions were done against the strongly expressed wishes of said aliens and others who invariably ended up rather messily succumbing to what were always reported to their homeworlds as 'tragic and unfortunate events'.

"Counselor?" Kyria growled. "So the Black Widow has moved up to the top ranks has she? What, the Grand Council got tired of having to explain the aftermath of your field missions to the Outworlders and they finally found a way to put you behind a desk where you at least have to fill out paperwork before you slaughter our own troops?" she venomously said.

Havitall gave an evil smile and icily replied "Quite the contrary colonel Matrix. I have taken over the position of my only superior, the late Counselor Draco. After his unfortunate and untimely demise the Grand Council felt I was the only real choice for his position." Her sneer returned, "Besides, that squadron was going to destroy a valuable outpost that my group was in the process of securing and I had to stop them from destroying our objective."

Member of the Grand Council or not, Kyria roared back "By using your top-command link to activate the remote-codes on our ships and dropping their shields so the Raider outpost's weapons could shred them? That squadron – _**MY**_ squadron, was acting under military orders to destroy that outpost at all costs. There was no mention at our briefings about any spec-ops trying to take it from the inside. You cost me the lives of thirteen damn good crews and nearly killed me as well!"

The Councilwoman snorted in disgust. "Your orders originated with me and I answered only to the Grand council, no one else! My dear, you were only supposed to be a diversion to the Raiders. I never expected the Link to be so effective in combat and your group was wiping out them out far too quickly! My unit was certainly not about to risk informing mere decoys of our true intent. Frankly, I honestly never thought you get that close to them before being blown from space. Besides, thanks to the diversion you created we were able to take them out _our_ way and secure the outpost. We gathered very valuable intel on the Raider's systems from it – information which by the way found the weaknesses in the Raiders cloaking tech that later gave Earth your decisive victory against them in the Outer Belt." She leaned forward on her desk and narrowed her eyes, "Beyond that, I suggest you start showing a little respect to your superiors. Space is a dangerous place and 'accidents' do happen."

"Dammit Havitall!" she protested. "This thing is _active!_ The field around it modulates for minimum required effect! The few brief scans that go through show that outer crust is a fused mass of rock and minerals that mostly defy analysis and also register a power source that's off the scale. Considering it's almost totally cloaked against scanners it was pure chance I came across it. On top of that the area where the cloak has failed, scans to be over a million years old! How could anyone know _anything_ about this?"

On her side of the link Havitall slightly turned her head then pressed a button on her desk and the audio went dead. She looked up and appeared to be heatedly talking someone else in the room with her. This went on for no more than a minute before she gave a quick nod of agreement, restored the audio and slammed her hands on her desk to give Kyria a final angry reply: "That is not for you to know _colonel_! You have your orders, carry them out at once!" The com then went black and fell silent as she cut the link before Kyria could say anything else.

Kyria fumed as she tried to quell her rage._"Havitall! Something is seriously NOT right about this... If that bitch is involved then they may as well start counting the bodies right now before they disappear. I just hope I'm not going to be one of them. She obviously is in this with someone else, but – who?" _

She continued to approach the anomaly and as she closed to within 11,000 meters of the the object her tiny craft began slowing down from the repulsion field around the object. She increased power to compensate and continued to move toward it, by the time she had reached what should be the inner edge of the shield her engines were at full military power and beginning to overload. Through the Link she felt in her very being her tiny ships distress and strains as it shook violently and gave its all to fight its way forward against the repulsion field. Her speed had dropped to only a few meters per-second when suddenly she was through! Freed from the field Kyria's ship leaped forward in a violent surge of acceleration before its AI cut forward power to the engines. From outside of the Link she felt her body thrashing around in her harness at the same time the AI snapped the craft around 180-degrees and fired the engines at full power to keep her from slamming into the object. In seconds it was over and her Rapier was at a standstill.

Kyria stepped down her Link to minimum and sat in her Rapier for a minute or so. Battered and stunned by the violent maneuvers, she slowly eased the tension to her safety harness and began stretching herself to clear the kinks from her neck and body. _"By all the Gods!"_ she thought as she moved, _"I am going to feel THAT later..."_ When she finally checked to see where the Rapier's AI had put her she found the ship had come to a dead stop about two kilometers above the surface of the mysterious object. The actual distance was constantly changing as if the ships sensors weren't sure it was really there. _"Curiouser and curiouser! Ok, let's see what is so special about you that the Black Widow herself wants you"_ Kyria said to herself. As she raised the Link to its maximum level and entered Naked Joy mode to be able to have ultimate sensory input. At once she slipped into the feeling of existing as only a point in space and took on a god's-eye view of all that was around herself for hundred's of kilometers as all the ships sensors flooded their information directly into her brain as she and the ship became one.

Briefly she gave herself the pleasure of directly being part of the incredible power coursing through the ships systems – engines, weapons, and vision that covered the entire electromagnetic spectrum. She basked in the glorious feeling of almost absolute power for a few more seconds before bringing her ship around to again face the object head-on and started slowly orbiting it to begin the task at hand. She switched on her forward work flood lights and tried to start detailed scans. This close to it she could see that it was no ordinary asteroid or burnt-out comet because while it had what could be an incredibly craggy exterior there were no craters on it. It certainly wasn't just a huge piece of debris from Earth's broken moon either. Visually, it was more like a spiked hole in space. The only reason she had any distance information and visual clues was because it, well, rippled like an inky black velvet pool, just enough for the eye and AI to catch that _something_ was there but not enough to discern exactly what or where.

As it turned beneath her it she slowly made out that it was a titanic mass of utterly black cracked, fused, and burnt crystals. Even this close to it and free from distortions that the objects deflection field caused, her tracking sensors refused to lock onto it and the analyzers could identify only a tiny portion of its composition with the rest not even showing up as being there. Kyria was stunned as she realized _"This thing isn't cloaked by a suppression field – it's exterior is naturally blocking sensors across the entire spectrum!"_

"_No wonder Havitall wants it!" _she thought to herself. _"Whatever is encasing that thing could make our ships totally undetectable. The ten-million credit question is – just how much does she know about it and how in the Seven Hells above did she come across whatever information she has?" _

Just then she felt a slight tingle as an energy sensor picker up something at the same time her other enhanced senses caught a discontinuity at the edge of the object and she began to see what was causing the single spike the sensors had been picking up. At first it was a faint and indistinct glow coming from a single small area on the surface that could be barely seen but as the artifact turned the glow rapidly became brighter. Kyria maneuvered the Rapier to match the now computable rotational axis to be over its location when it swung underneath her ship. As it grew closer her sensors became alive with data pouring in: So far they were picking up that the flaw in the outer casing was a hole roughly 500 meters across with no clue to its depth so far because data was still only from reflections off the walls of the hole. Mineral compositions as yet unknown to the on-board databases were dutifully recorded and then something got got her attention that began to alarm Kyria – incredible levels of energy beaming out of the opening that quickly overloaded and destroyed some of the ships sensors giving her the sensation of several sharp and painful twinges as they went out. Even just catching what had to be lower-power diffracted energies pouring out of the hole began to be actually painful to her, so she immediately began lowering the ships interaction with her.

Kyria knew that if she was already taking minor damage from just reflected scatter she did NOT want to be in the path of that now very quickly approaching hole. She hit her thrusters to move out of the way and felt the engines come alive with power. The Rapier turned slightly on it axis and she truly became alarmed when she saw that aside from that small movement, the ship didn't budge. Even though she knew that everything about her situation was hopefully being relayed by the ship to Lunar command – and Havitall – Kyria tried to contact them as she ran up the engines to emergency levels. _"Lunar command! Lunar command! Emergency! Requesting emergency extraction!The artifact has me locked in a tractor beam! Havitall! Damn it, anybody come in!"_ Nothing. She cursed as it became obvious that the stellar amounts of energies flooding from the opening was effectively jamming all communications. She was now in a full blown panic as her engines screamed at her in overload just before they shuddered into a dreadful silence. Staring at was rapidly approaching, for the first time since it had been implanted she shut down her Link to shield herself from the Rapiers agonies as it began to die around her.

Rising from the now blinding and very rapidly approaching hole like a insanely glorious aurora Kyria saw fabulous curtains of raw energy flooding out and knew that soon she and her tiny ship were going to be turned to plasma by that beautiful maelstrom.

To Kyria, things began to flow in a surreal dreamlike slow-motion: She remembered the ship taking on the eldrich blue glow of St. Elmo's Fire inside and out as it accumulated charged particles. She watched in cold detachment as the hypnotic cold flames dance across her instruments causing the displays to erupt in flashes of light before one by one winking out as the static charges fried their electronics. One by one, all the ships systems were being overwhelmed and destroyed.

As her ship rapidly died around her, her mind seemed to take a detour and a soothing resigned calm came over her. She remember thinking as she played with the streamers of static glow streaming from her finger tips _"Hmm. With this much stray energy pouring through here I'm probably already dead from radiation. Another dot on Havitall's list. Well, I hope _something_ good comes from this."_

She looked out at the wall of energy now only a few hundred meters away and as her Rapier started to actually break apart she remembered, _"Great. So much for at least dying in battle. Instead I get be be crispy-fried by an alien artifact found during a rock busting mission. Shit!"_

Then - interminable blackness closed in around her. For her, time stopped.

A dark fog filled Kyria's thoughts and the distant pair of glowing white eyes returned. To Kyria, from somewhere outside of all this Raven's voice calmly told her, _"Kyria, We told you before that there is a hole in your mind – it is here that the break begins. This will be, um, a bit – unusual..."_ In her dreamlike state Kyria took this strange event in stride and simply said _"Huh?"_

The eyes in the mist frowned and she heard the Voice give a mixed sigh, _"Raven! She is drifting in too deep."_ The mood of the Voice slightly changed along with its influence on her, _ "Mmm, come on girl, stay with us here."_ Suddenly Kyria had a snap of clarity and remembered just what was going on – the being called Phoenix composed of Raven & Starfire joined as one had entered her mind and was controlling it, replaying memories from 75 years ago. The ghostly eyes opened wide for a moment as they caught that thought. To themselves Raven and Starfire flashed the same thoughts, _"75 years ago?! Just how old is she? We would have put her age at mid-thirties at most."_

The Voice turned its attention back to Kyria. _"Good. You're back with us. So far everything has been as it was. It is from when you blacked out your memories you have been changed. There is over six months that has been erased and replaced with falsehoods! We see what truly was. But before we..."_ Kyria abruptly cut them off. _"Six months_? That's impossible! There are medical records and Council recordings showing what happened to me after I was rescued! I've SEEN them!"

With another exasperated sigh the Voice resumed. _"Kyria – you were never 'rescued'. Those records were created long after, probably just before you were promoted to a position that could give you access to them."_

"!!!" Kyria was stunned at that revelation. "But I..." She stopped as she admitted to herself that they may be right. That part of her memories and much of what shortly followed never felt, well, quite right to her. Suddenly something deep inside of her rebelled at that thought as it always did whenever she had questioned those events from so long ago. Usually it simply assured her that any contrary thoughts were silly, that they were simply confused fragments and fantasies of other events. Now that small voice was almost in a panic, desperate to convince her that her current memories _were the TRUTH –_ all else was a lie! That desperate feeling set her resolve. "Fine," she told Phoenix. "Show me what really happened."

"_Before we do, we're going to recap just what you think you remember. It will give us a time-line to work around. Here we go again!"_

Images now rapidly flashed by and then would briefly slow down as her mind seemed to fast-forward to key spots before moving on again.

The first was her remembering being jarred back to hazy consciousness as a search and rescue ship grappled the mangled remains of her small craft and drew it on board. Later, in the ships infirmary she was told that several days ago just as her ship started to come apart, something in the Artifact – it was now officially being called that – finally sensed what was happening to her ship and and had flung it safely away from the seething maelstrom of energies. Somehow one of the ships emergency beacons had survived the electrical onslaught and once her ship was clear of the interference surrounding it Lunar command had picked it up and sent this ship to get her. Even more incredibly, along the wall of the hole a slim corridor had opened in that blast of energies which allowed safe passage down to the core of the Artifact. Whatever it was, sensor cloak or not, it _wanted_ to be found and explored which several properly equiped teams were now doing even as they spoke.

Images flew by then slowed again: As weeks had gone by she was hailed by the Grand Council itself for finding what they were calling the single most important thing ever found in Earth's history. Another jump forward – rumors and reports started circulating that a vast repository of technology and artifacts had been discovered within it, items created by an entirely unknown advanced species that seemed to come from Earth's distant past long before even the most primitive ancestors of the Human race were ever thought to exist.

More jumps. This round stopped at 6 months after Kyria's discovery: Amongst this treasure trove of technology four devices called Transport Orbs had been found which revolutionized travel between Earth and a few select locations. One orb was already installed in Earth's primary alien-technology research center at Jump City, two at far flung off-world defense research centers located along the suns opposite poles while the remaining orb was placed with Earth's Grand Council which had since been moved to its broken moon.

"_Four orbs? But Raven, you said there were five! "_

" _I know Star. You want to bet on which one isn't accounted for?"_

"_Why would I wish to do such a thing? It is certain that any wager against it being the one we seek would be most unwise."_

"_... Never mind Star..."_

"_??? Oh. It was -- the 'Sarcasm'. I never am very good at that..."_

"_Ya think? Back to the show..."_

"_Interesting... From here your memories are untouched. Mind if we get a look at what's been happening here on Earth since then?"_

Kyria gave a resigned mental sigh. "Do I really have a choice?"

"_No."_

The memories of Kyria's past again began a rapid series of jumps forward while Raven and Starfire continued to watch: Earth's researchers rapidly began applying this new knowledge and within 5 years Earth's civilizations had been transformed. For Kyria, promotions came fast and soon she was made a regional commander and leader of Jump City along with its newly built underground sister, Cyber City-1. Mankind began exploring the extremes of its possible evolutions through Total AI Integration into humans along with forced genetics often involving off-world DNA. Shortly after that started, the alien races began leaving Earth with a mixture of fear and disgust.

Then – disaster – what was assumed to be some type of attack began assailing certain areas of Earth's surface. A tremendous column of seething purple energy would come down from the sky and envelope roughly a square kilometer on the ground and settle into a perfect cube. In essence, a full cubic km of Earthspace was briefly being hijacked! Inside of the cubes, everything that had been trapped was briefly transformed into - something else. People who had gone through the experience spoke of being 'shifted' to a different reality. At times the changes were almost imperceptible, perhaps just a different scent in the air and slight change in the color of the sky, at others the changes were _very_ substantial to the point of things and people becoming unrecognizable along with all the usual physical laws of nature being chucked out the window..

Without exception the cubes remained on on the ground for only a few short minutes before once again shooting backup into the sky mostly leaving behind everything that had been trapped inside of them. People, plants and animals were returned to normal reality again – but not as they once were. While plants and animals all showed significant and puzzling genetic changes it was the people who were changed the most. In all cases their AI implants had been removed and the people altered to again exist without them. To many researchers, what was even more alarming is that the victims are being genetically retro-modified back to what they would have been without the accelerated genetic enhancements they and their progenitors had gone through.

The people who had been changed were designated as 'Pre-Mutant, Obsolete Human' or 'PMOH' for short and presented a serious problem to Earth's rulers - granted, without the AI or genetic enhancements they were fully able to live and function as a low-level mutant but without those enhancements they were also at a great disadvantage compared to the rest of Earth's population. In fairly rare cases a good portion of mutant abilities might be able to be restored but it required constant treatments to sustain them and without continuous genetic reinforcement the people soon reverted back to PMOH as their bodies actively suppressed the enhancements.

The removed AI implants were an even bigger problem. Re-implantation was totally impossible because part of the genetic change involved a type of induced allergy to the materials, emissions and stimulations of the AI units themselves. Within hours of re-implantation the subjects brains began to physically reject the presence of the AI's. Symptoms of the rejection was particularly gruesome – the persons brain began to rapidly and uncontrollably swell. Once that started, first came dementia followed by violent body spasms and then coma. Even if the AI was quickly removed all of the subjects died in less than a single day as the brain's reaction to them was unstoppable. Even worse – PMOH's could not even be within several meters of anyone who had an AI in them or they began showing the same signs. At least they recovered when quickly moved away and kept isolated from anyone with an AI implant but continued proximity was soon fatal.

So far there was no way known to restore these people because no one had _any_ idea how these changes were being brought about, what the cubes were or even how they were produced and much less, how to stop them. As far as Earth's scientists knew these retrogrades and the AI-rejecting biologic booby-traps were impossible. The cubes they could at least theorize about but all aspects of this attack had to involve technologies far more advanced than anything Earth had ever heard of. As to the reality-changes while inside of the cubes the victims spoke of – no one knew what to make of that. Very soon after the attacks began and with no other choice available to them, Earth's leaders began segregating PMOH's away from general society by placing them in 'Rehabilitation Centers' located in the most remote areas of the globe. The general population was reassured that these camps were being very successful in providing useful work and decent living conditions for 'these unfortunate victims' and that they were being removed from the general population 'for their own good'.

As Kyria rose in authority she soon learned that was only part of the story. Like all effective propaganda, it was slightly true – being isolated from the AI's present in the rest of Earth's population was the only way PMOH's could live. However, only a very few knew that the truth was far more sinister. All too soon tales that could not be easily dismissed darkly told that some of the 'Rehabilitation Centers' were nothing more that bio-recycling/disposal sites and experimental stations where PMOH's were reduced to nothing more than feedstock for bio-engineering and bio-weapons research. While she didn't have first-hand knowledge of that happening, she did know that the few centers she had seen were no more than feudal low-tech towns that were located in barely habitable areas of the planet surrounded by automated and deadly enforced perimeters. Outside of mainstream government care or concern you were on your own to survive in them. She also knew that the centers were under the direct control of Councilor Havitall's old special-ops group. Given _that_ fact, she also knew the less one inquired about these 'Rehabilitation Centers' the more likely you were to stay alive.

What was baffling to Earth's military leaders was that these distortions were always in city areas suspiciously close to key research facilities or military installations and yet as far as they could tell, there was no pattern as to who or what was being targeted by these distortions. More often than not it was the general population areas near them that was attacked instead of the critical sector involved with industry, government, or the military. Who or whatever was behind the attacks obviously could strike any place on the planet with impunity yet and cause untold destruction and yet didn't. What was the point of these attacks? It just didn't make military sense.

Suddenly Kyria's dreamlike recollection jarred to a stop as Raven forcefully stepped in. Her voice rang in Kyria's mind: _"Enough. Kyria, you have opened the door to a force beyond anything this realm has seen in millions of years. A race of beings even worse than my father was. Time to raise the curtain and let you see what has been unleashed once again."_

At that, Starfire and Raven joined their minds as Phoenix and matter-of-factly told her _"__Sorry, but this is going to hurt."_ As an after thought Phoenix added,_** "**__Um, make that, hurt a LOT____"_ Before Kyria could begin to respond they delved deep into Kyria's physical mind with searing mental tendrils as she screamed in agony. Her mind was afire in agonies as they set straight the pathways that had been corrupted and amplified the chemical markers of memory which had been dimmed almost to non-existence. The false memories she had been given were expunged in another flash of searing pain. In the physical world, with burning white eyes Starfire and Raven both watched as Kyria's still unconscious body writhed and twisted while her mind was reshaped by them and then as her body gave a tremendous gasp and final shudder, it was over.

Back in Kyria's mind the mental fires rapidly died and memories returned. A most peculiar feeling came over her as she seemed to join Phoenix on the sidelines to watch herself as she began to re-live what had been suppressed for so long.

She was back inside of her disintegrating Rapier as rapidly approaching brilliant curtains of energies pouring out from the chasm in the Artifact. She was almost casual as she shut down the litany of alarms screaming at her, "Main engines – dead. Impulse thrusters – dead. Navigation AI and thrusters – dead. Weapons systems – dead. Main power – dead. Shields – dead. Life-support – off-line but possibly able to be restarted – not that it mattered. Kyria watched as a brilliant yellow spear of energy broke from the dazzling curtain of death and ran through the back of her ship vaporising a hole large enough for her to fit through and she felt her suit tighten under the reverse pressure as what little air that was inside of the ship vented to space. That left only her environmental suit keeping her alive and without the ships resources that would only be good for a few days.

A philosophical calm came over her as she thought, "Well, a few more of those and I'll be nothing more than a puff of ionized gas. Whup! Here they come..." Kyria had spotted a cluster of three dark-violet bolts of energy snaking towards her. Mere seconds before impact she closed her eyes and braced herself for the end to come.

It didn't.

What Kyria and the councilor hadn't realized was that long before she had detected the Anomaly, something else within it had found her first. Ancient minds of pure evil far older than the Azar carefully examined her and the technology surrounding her. They sensed her Link and became very pleased. "**Soon... so soon...**" they croaked as their minds strained past the barriers that for so long stopped them and reached out to her.

Those who desired to pass through the object within it had acted the instant they realized that the Azar Vault had been damaged. Over the long aeon's of their banishment from the one realm that had defeated them, they had not forgotten about it. Conquerers and Masters of the five other realms that were connected to their own, they knew this single new one would be the most important in their long history. None of the others connected to anywhere else but _this_ one would change all that.

For long ages they had thrown all their Powers against the Vault and nothing they could do disturbed it the slightest bit. After aeons they finally had to concede heir tactical setback and stopped assaults against the barriers that the Azar had created but they were certainly _not_ going to forget about Earth and the myriad of new realms that were connected to it – that was a Prize they would NOT be denied!

Before they turned their focus to other matters they created immortal creatures aptly called Watchers with one and only one purpose to their existence: To monitor the Vault's defenses – for all Eternity if need be – and when the slightest weakness was detected they would let The Hand know of it.

The Watchers did not fail in their unsleeping and single-minded vigilance. Raven's destruction of Azarath had rocked the Vault to its core as its outermost shell became exposed when Azarath was ripped apart and sucked into the Void. While the Vaults extraordinary defenses made it the only bit of Azarath to survive, assailed by the incomprehensible energies Raven had unleashed against her father they were weakened and its shell cracked. Thrown clear of the rip in space-time that drew the rest of Azarath and Raven's father into the Void, the Vault remained hidden in the lunar debris from the nearby and now nearly shattered Earth's moon.

The breach in its outer adamantium shell was causing changes in the Vault's inner barriers that the Watchers detected and a single message was immediately sent out to their masters - "_THE DOOR HAS BEEN OPENED!_" Far off in their home realms The Hand received the message sent by their servants and without delay had responded. They ordered their most powerful techno-wizards to begin a new assault on the Vault's weakened inner defenses and over mere centuries they had succeeded in opening the tiniest crack back into the realm that they had been driven from so long ago.

Through that crack they were only able to monitor and influence things in the space near the outside of the Vault but that would be enough. But within it, they were able to do slightly more. They re-purposed the Watchers and atom by atom managed to shift them to just outside the primary barriers but that was the limit of their abilities. Try as they might, their creations could do nothing to release the wards that were the heart of the Vault's defenses or pass beyond that inner secondary zone, only ethereal probes could reach any significant distance through the trans-dimensional gate to the Outside.

Of course, this was not unexpected. Long long ago for the first time in their history The Hand had been forced to admit that a race had finally stopped them cold. Though they did not know it _how _was done, they respected the mastery of Time and Space that the Azar had used to hold them at bay for so very long. Obviously they needed someone from outside of their control or creation to release the wards and take the Key Orb and its brethren from the Vault to the Outside. Then once again The Hand could resume the process of taking their rightful place as masters over all that is.

Now that someone had arrived. The Hand sent a message to their Watchers _**"Bring her to the gate."**_

The violent buffeting stopped and for several seconds Kyria had a wild flurry of thoughts: Wild panic, memories of friends and lovers, deadly hatred of a certain woman - now councilor – and then confusion. "Come on, come on!" she screamed to herself, "I'm as ready for Death as as I'll ever be!" Still nothing. Puzzlement now took center stage as she thought, "Ok... This is being dead? This can't be right..." Kyria cautiously opened one eye fully expecting to see Death incarnate staring back at her. Instead she saw the ship had stopped moving towards the torrent of Power flooding out from the Artifact. The violet tendrils she had though were her doom were wrapping themselves around her ship and encasing it in what for all the world looked liked a gigantic cocoon of transparent purple energy. She opened both eyes and wildly looked around her trying to make sense of that had happened. She should be dead!

Once it was fully covered Kyria became amazed as her tiny ship began to be pulled by the tendrils which were shielding her down into the blazing chasm and deep into the artifact. The journey down was stunning, it seemed that the craggy outer shell was the only solid part of the Artifact and was only a few hundred meters thick, after that came something or, she suspected, _somewhere_ else. The fountains of energy streaming from the Artifact were pouring out from those – other – regions that apparently were made of pure energy. Though there now was no possible sense of scale as she approached what had to be near the core she noticed what seemed to be a large stone ring. The tendrils encasing her were flowing out from its center and she began to think , _"I might just live after all, at least for a little longer. After that there's still the question of getting out of here in one piece!"_

As she approached the ring Kyria saw blazing cryptic runes covering its surface. _"Freeze"_ Raven called out and the imagery stopped. _"Those symbols are Azar are they not?"_ Starfire asked. _"That they are my Love."_ Like manipulating a 3D editor Raven rotated the scene in Kyria's mind until the entrance and its runes faced them square on. Off on the sidelines with the glowing eyes that she knew were Phoenix, a dumbfounded Kyria commented_ "Okay – now that's just plain weird. These are __my__ thoughts and yet we're here watching them like a vid... All we need now is some popcorn."_

In the real-world Starfire gleefully giggled out, "What a grand idea! It has been quite the long time since we have enjoyed exploded bits of corn with the curdled cow squeezings!" and with that, bags of buttered popcorn appeared in her and Raven's hands along with some for Kyria's mental avatar. Raven shot Star a dark look but as she saw her joyously cram handfuls of it into her mouth she gave a shrug knowing there was no fighting it. Through their bond with each other she was already sharing Starfires sensations as she mawed into her huge bag that was almost as big as she was. Raven began to salivate as she looked at her much smaller normal-sized bag – at least Star remembered Raven would want far less. Damn! It _did_ smell good. She popped a few kernels into her mouth and sucked on them. _"Mmm, tis better to experience it first-hand rather than only through her" _she sighed as she savored its salty and buttery goodness.

Back in Kyria's dream world, Kyria blinked in surprise as a warm bag of popcorn appeared in her hands. _"Whaaa?"_ she exclaimed knocking some kernels from the bag as she nearly dropped it. _"Sorry, but Star thought it was a good idea you had so she acted on it." _Kyria gave a blank look at the Eyes in the dark mists of her mind. _"Whaa.. how... is it real?" _she stammered out. Once again, the Eyes gave that odd shrug_ "As real as it needs to be. Go ahead and enjoy it. Meanwhile, back to the show._

Raven turned her attention back to the runes. _"Thiiisss, isn't good"_ she drawled out. With a wave of her mind they re-wrote themselves into words they could all read. The message was simple, clear, and left absolutely no doubt about its meaning: TRANSDIMENSIONAL CONTAINMENT VAULT. APPROACH OR ENTRY FORBIDDEN TO ALL. YOU ENTER- YOU DIE – YOU CHOOSE.

More for Kyria's benefit than hers Starfire asked_"Raven, I assume that is truly is the Vault you spoke of which contained the trans-dimensional orbs that lead to realms ruled by The Hand?"_

"_It is. It obviously _was _thrown clear from the heart of Azarath before it collapsed into the Void along with most of my father. I'm curious to see how its defenses were breached. The same blast that, um, broke the moon, seems to have cracked the Vault's outer adamantium shell but there are several other layers to it that had to have been penetrated by The Hand after its defenses were weakened."_

Raven was impressed as she noted_ "The Vault's interior appears to be a part of the Void that was somehow split off or something an awful lot like it that has been encased in the shell to keep the Hand from using any portals to transit through the Void to somewhere else or restrict them from using telepathy to influence anyone outside of the Vault. As for the ring, it's obviously a dimensional gate of some sort that probably leads to the primary containment zone where the orbs actually are – or were. Well, let's find out if I'm right."_

Back in the mists of Eternity, Phoenix shot Res'al a dark thought, "You know, that is an interesting little bit of wizardry the Azar used – pinching off a piece of the Void like that."

"Mmmm. I'm surprised they managed to come up with a way to do it so early in their development."

"Not as much as I am – considering that I know for a fact that they didn't develop abilities like that for several thousand more years." Phoenix continued to mentally glare at Res'al. "Ya know, the energies emanating from it that we sense we're picking up from it feels _real_ familiar."

If Res'al had eyebrows – or for that matter, any other part of a physical form in the Mists – he would have raised them and given a wry grin. "I'm not sure I care for the tone of that... What's your point? I've had nothing to do with it if that's what you're getting at. At least I'm pretty sure I won't will haven't done it... Of course, considering how many bits of me are wandering everywhere and every-when through that Multiverse I suppose it's always a possibility. It's also just as possible that you may have will be going to have done it." Phoenix groaned. "Ow! Damn it, you know how it makes our brains hurt when you start mixing time tenses like that!"

Res'al shrugged his non-shoulders. "You know of a better way to describe our actions in a timeless context?" Phoenix just growled. "Remind me when this is over to go back and see who willing won't be having done what when." Res'al playfully groaned back "Holy Hanna! And you say me doing that makes your brains hurt. That was a really good minds bender!"

"You deserved it" Phoenix giggled.

Kyria's memories resumed playback with her ship approaching the stone gate which she saw had a brilliant shimmering surface in its center that looked like a rippling pool of mercury. The violet tendrils encasing her ship pulled her into it and a kaleidoscope of colors and shapes screamed by her as her ship crossed unfathomable regions of space and time. Again and again as she careened through bizarre realms nightmarish creatures assailed her ship but never were able to break through the violet cocoon. Shortly it emerged from another ring into a tremendous dimly lit chamber where the tendrils had been rising from a large glowing pentagram incised into the floor. Her ship came to rest in the center of it and the tendrils dissipated along with the cocoon encasing her ship. For several minutes Kyria just sat in her Rapier shaking with fear and awe from what she had just gone through.

Slowly Kyria calmed down from the ordeal and as it became clear that it was over – at least for now – she instinctively started to assess her situation. First on her list was the condition of her flight suit. While it was normally supplied with power and air from the ship is was of course also fully self-sufficient and able to provide life-support for several days on its own systems when needed. A quick check of its stats told her that it was in surprisingly good shape with no significant damage and its power and life support were at nearly full capacity. _"Great" _she thought to herself, _"Gods know where I am or how far from Earth, but I have"_ she check the suits stats again, _"four point oh-two days of life-support – not that it will help much if no one finds me..."_

Even without leaving her ship it was obvious that the Rapier was beyond hope, all power was dead and from the cockpit she could see that large pieces of of it were either hopelessly mangled or outright missing having been ripped away by the energy blasts that had struck it. Looking out of the canopy she noticed that the ground seemed, well, fuzzy. She felt a bit light and raised her arm in front of her then let it drop, from the speed she guessed that wherever this place was, it had about one-half of Earth's gravity. "Well, I might as well take a look around my new home" she said to herself. Not really expecting anything to happen she tried opening the cockpit but the power lifts were dead. "_No matter" _she thought, she still had the emergency releases. She manually tripped the explosive bolts and blew the canopy. When it finally crashed back down a short distance away she was surprised to hear it and echoes several seconds later. Sound meant there's an atmosphere! As for the timing of the reverberations – the long delay meant this place was huge – at least several kilometers to the nearest walls!

Kyria ran a quick scan with the suits external environment sensors and was stunned to find there was not only an atmosphere, but more importantly – it was a breathable one. Reasonably warm but substantially higher in oxygen at a touch over 30 and a with very odd mixture of other inert gases making up the balance along with very high humidity meaning water was here as well, she could now at least hope to survive until she starved to death. Kyria carefully cracked the seals on her suit and sniffed the air. She was immediately assailed by a bizarre mix of odors _"Interesting... A bit musty with a nasty sulfurous tinge, but overall, it smells like – spearmint and cinnamon!"_

She kept her helmet on with its faceplate open and shut off the suits air supply to save it in case it was needed later. She stepped from her mangled ship to find it in the center of a large and still faintly glowing pentagram that was incised into the floor. At the very edge of its perimeter was a cleanly cut wall of something gray that was almost half a meter deep. Kyria walked over and bent down to examine it. More than anything it looked like a very fine and matted fibrous dust much like pocket lint. Apparently whatever had brought her here through the stone gate apparently had vaporized the layer of it covering the pentagram.

As she ran some of it through her fingers she said to herself _"Hmmph. Whatever this stuff is it must not burn well or else with the high oxygen level here this entire chamber would have gone up like a torch – and me with it!"_ She stood up again and tentatively put one foot up onto the stuff to try and stand on it. With a fair amount of resistance as it went in her foot slowly sank into the material halfway to her knee before it stopped and became stuck like being in thick mud. With considerable effort she managed to pull it free but was now faced with the realization that there was no way for her to explore where she was. Just a few steps into that stuff and she would become hopelessly mired in it.

Kyria aimlessly looked around in despair at her situation when she noticed six pairs of red lights rather rapidly moving across the chamber towards her location. _"This can't be good..."_ she thought to herself and after she rapidly stripped off her environmental suit leaving her in her standard form-adaptive uniform she morphed into her were-beast shape and grabbed her sidearm to be ready for whatever was approaching. With the lights still a good distance away she allowed herself the luxury of giving her ass a good scratch all the while grumbling to herself with her standard complaint about space suits : "Here we are with more a thousand years in space yet we still have to rely on low-residue nutrients and shove a tube up our ass to take a dump in a space suit without wallowing in it. There MUST be a better way!"

Finally when the lights grew closer her jaw dropped when she saw just what they were. They were the glowing red eyes of two very odd creatures rolling towards her.

Dust bunnies. That was the only thing she could think of. Giant dust bunnies almost three meters in diameter, each with 3 pairs of burning red eyes and armed with spears or some other kind of long stick-shaped weapons. "They sure don't look like they're here to cheerfully greet me to their rather fuzzy home" she thought. How they carried the spears and how the eyes stayed near the top of their bodies she had no idea. She could see that the creatures moved by rolling along the ground but their eyes stayed firmly floating in-place while their fuzzy bodies turned underneath. Like the eyes, their weapons just seemed to float next to them.

Starfire had a different opinion and squealed with glee the instant she saw them, _"Oh Raven, they are ADORABLE!"_ she gushed._ "When this is over we MUST create some of them when we remake our home!"_ Raven just growled until she looked at Star and almost literally saw hearts of love in her eyes. She knew that look all too well and was certain there was no fighting it. Being as-one with her she was also keenly aware of Starfire's intense joy over seeing these highly odd creatures. _"Great"_ she growled to herself, _"It's Silky all over again"_ she thought, remembering Starfire's pet during their days with the Teen Titans. With a sigh she gave in, _"Starfire my love, only you would think giant evil red-eyed dust bunnies brandishing weapons could be 'adorable'! Fine. When we remake BRCM or somewhere else, there'll be giant evil dust bunnies for you."_ She raised an eyebrow and added,_ "I wonder how they are in battle?"_

Meanwhile, Kyria's reconstructed memories played on: Damn that stuff on the floor! She really wished she could move around without sinking into it! By now the 'Dust Bunnies' had reached the edge of the cleared circle and stopped. Kyria watched nervously as the two of them circled her position as if they were deciding what to do next. While she was distracted by them, an ethereal purple tendril shot from the pentagram and struck her. Those who had been watching and guiding her knew their best access to her was through her Link and with singular purpose and precision the flowing streamer struck directly at it. The Link's firewalls and multi-layered encryption posed no barrier at all as they took control of it and used the Link's direct connection to her brain to flash read her memories. The resulting overload of information transfer knocked her out cold and as she sank to the floor she remembered seeing the dust bunnies enter the circle and move to either side of her, after that – blackness for a time.

Kyria awoke to being held between the two creatures as they moved quite rapidly over the fluff that covered the chambers floor. She tried struggling and quickly found that she was all but immobilized by invisible bonds created by the creatures. "Let me Go!" she screamed at them. "I said, LET ME GO!" The only sign that the creatures were even hearing her was that both of them turned one pair of their eyes towards her. The eyes were a dark burning red that briefly and brightly flashed as they fixed their gaze on her. Their pace never slackened and after a few seconds all eyes returned forward to wherever they were heading.

She tried to move again with very little success. Whatever the creatures were holding her with it was quite effective. "It looks like I'm stuck with these two dust balls for the time being" she grumbled to herself. At least she could move her head a bit so she looked over her captors as best she could but learned little. Her first impression of 'dust bunnies' was spot-on. The creatures looked like they were made of the the same material that covered the floor here. While they moved by rolling along the ground their eyes, weapons, and her stayed firmly in place and fairly motionless while they moved. Their six eyes seemed to simply float in front of the top part of their bodies and the long spear-like weapons they carried, like her, just hung near their sides. "Hmph. Probably held in place by the same thing holding me like invisible arms," she struggled a little more and flexed a bit to get an idea of where the bonds were, "Umm, maybe more like tentacles and from the feel of them, fairly long ones as well – good to remember about that." she thought to herself.

In a short while Kyria spotted that they were rapidly moving toward a distant dim flickering light. It quickly grew into what looked to be another large stone portal with a seething field of multi-colored energy in its center. "Ooookayyy..." she thought, "Looks like the shows about to start!"

The giant dust bunnies brought her to a large clearing in front of the stone ring. Like the circle around her ship, for several hundreds of meters around in front of the seething orifice the ever-present fluff covering the floor had been cleanly removed without leaving a trace. The dust bunnies lowered her to the floor at the edge of the clearing and after releasing her rolled back a short way back into the fluff then stopped and just stared at her.

Still keeping her were-beast form she stared back and just gave a long low growl at them for a while. Now apparently completely ignoring her they never moved or blinked.

Finally she roared at them "Come on, now what?!" Still nothing, just their unmoving multiple pairs of burning eyes watching her.

"Fine. I guess you've done your part for now. I take it you're the only way across this stuff" she grimly thought as she glanced at the fluff. Just as around her ship there was a clean and crisp cut where the clearing was and the fluff started. Here too, it came up to her knees and although she didn't bother to try she knew it was probably just as hard to move through. "I hope you guys are sticking around to give me a return trip!" she growled at them and with that parting comment she turned around and with a snort, wandered towards the portal.

With it still some distance away, as Kyria moved towards the dazzling light she casually looked down at the floor and stopped short in amazement. Even from back at the edge of the clearing the light from the portal showed it to be a deep royal-blue but here, closer up and brighter, now she also saw intricate patterns were inlaid into it. For as far as she could see dark bronze colored traces covered the floor in an incredible arabesque of complex designs and cryptic shapes. Kyria crouched down and as she traced a claw over one of the designs it briefly lit up with a dim violet glow and faded out again. She did it again several times to different shapes and designs around her and aside from making different colors they all did the same thing. Once she got an entire arc that ran from her to both walls to glow and she stopped to think. "What in all the Seven Hells does _that_ mean? If this whole place can do that..." Her fur began to prickle on the back of her neck as she gazed over the immense clearing. With another low growl of displeasure she got up and continued towards the light.

Watching all of this in Kyria's mind, Starfire piped in. _"What indeed does it mean?"_

Raven was fascinated by it. _"Iii'vvvve got a feeling this is the Lock that the Azar created to twist the one remaining dimensional link to where the obs are. It is the key to the inner core of the Vault!"_ she answered. A bit more softly she finished with _"and I have NO idea how it works but I think we're about to find out."_

Starfire tried to remember anything about something like this but she realized that oddly, no Azar memories of what this was came to her, only its purpose. Cautiously she asked, _"Raven, we were given all the the knowledge of the Azar when they passed into us were we not? Is this not a ward of some sort? A barrier between here and"_ Star nodded towards the blazing portal, _"the other side of that. Why is it that I cannot recall its secrets?_"

"_Yes. We've always been able to recall their knowledge as needed. At least, until now."_ As Kyria approached what Raven knew was a Gate unlike anything they knew of, Raven tried to study what she saw on the floor. Bits and pieces of it seemed vaguely familiar and then it was gone. _"You're right, it is some type of ward or rather an incredibly intertwined collection of wards but just what or how – I'm getting a blank. The same with you Star?"_

"_Indeed it is 'the blank'. Why has this knowledge not been passed to us?"_ Both were silent for a while as Kyria neared the Gate. Suddenly Starfire had a thought._ "Could they be a knot of some type with the wards bound together as one?"_

Raven gave a small sigh. _"Star, You really should pay better attention to my thoughts when we are dealing with this type of metaphysical tech. This is not supposed to be possible! Attempting to combine wards always results in them shorting out as they fight against each other. The Azar knew of at least one entire planet was vaporised from the energy released by idiots using that idea to try and create a planetary defense shield."_

Raven paused and gave a dark grin, _"But I gotta say, in a way it worked quite well."_

Starfire mentally blinked. _"Err? It worked?"_

Raven giggled, _"Yep. After the blast tore the planet apart – taking most of the once vast fleet of warships that were attacking with it – the surviving invaders took one look at the rubble pile that was left of the planet and decided to leave with what little of their proud Imperial Grand Fleet that remained. Even better, the fleet was so annihilated and the surviving ships so heavily damaged by the blast that they were unable to defend themselves against the planets REALLY pissed-off outer-belt colonies as they tried to leave the star system. The invaders were destroyed to the last ship. The once fractious and feuding colonies joined together and rebuilt themselves into a fairly large local empire for a time. Sooo actually, it worked like a charm!_

_Point is, if this _is_ a collection or like you called it a 'knot' of wards, where's the energy release? Where's the aura of Power that should surround the individual wards much less the ripping of Time and Space that should be happening from them being in contact with each other? Even through Kyria's memories we should be able to sense them and yet – nothing!"_

"_I agree. All I sense is the Power coming from that Gate and even that is – muted. It is most strange. Oh! She has arrived at it!"_

Kyria had stopped in front of the portal a few meters away from it and gaped like a beast at night that's been shined by a spotlight. The opening in the stone circle was a good ten meters across and filled with an entrancing maelstrom of Power. Dazzling energies flowing over the surface continuously shifted through the entire spectrum of colors and at then times looked like a shimmering pool of iridescent mercury much like the surface of the first ring she had traveled through. Unlike that first one she could see no markings on this one. Even this close to it she could feel no heat from it despite the almost blinding intensity of it at times. In fact, it literally felt cold as she stared at it. She noticed that her backside was still comfortably warm while she could actually see her breath in front of her when she blew towards the barrier. Fascinated by it, she stepped closer and without a second thought she reached out and with a single claw slowly touched it. She was surprised to find it felt quite solid. Now even more curious she sharply tapped on it with the tip of her claw. It gave a clear 'ping' and instantly the barrier calmed to a shiny and perfectly smooth silvery-white surface. Kyria drew her hand back from it and where the tip of her claw had touched its surface a subtle glow appeared that started to spread out in a series of slow ripples that went out to the rim of the opening where they collected in a widening band of light.

Based on what had happened to her so far, Kyria quickly stepped back from the stone portal fully expecting to be sucked into it or dragged through it by another set of ethereal tentacles. The last thing she expected to happen was to hear a voice that sounded like it was right next to her.

It was a soft and inquisitive young voice like that of a quiet friend from her childhood but had an odd multiplicity to it, like several were talking in unison "Hello? Is someone out there?" it/they sweetly asked.

"Ha who wha...???" Kyria stammered out in surprise and she rapidly twisted her head to look around for its source. The voices grew slightly more serious and went on, "How nice! There _is_ someone out there. We're not standing near you if that's what you're looking for. We're just in your head. Kyria put a hand to her head and looked at the still glowing metallic surface of the portal. "In my head? How... where..." The voice took on a teasing feel and interrupted her, "Yes, we're on the other side of that Gate in front of you. You know, you don't sound very bright or for that matter, look it" the voice taunted. "How ever did a beast like you make it to this place? "

This was not at all what she had been ready for. "Now just hold on a minute..." she started to say before the voices interrupted her. "Ah! Good, the big bad wolf can actually put together a coherent sentence. Maybe this will work after all" it teasingly continued. "Do you like to play with puzzles?"

That _really_ caught her off guard and her brain farted again, "Wha... Puzzles? Just who in the.. Listen, I just..." Kyria stopped for a moment to gather her thoughts when the voices resumed their cheerful taunts in perfect unison, "Oh dear. Maybe it really is just a big dumb animal after all. Would the big green doggy like to play with a ball? A really pretty big ball?" Much to Kyria's chagrin, her tail actually gave a couple of brisk wags as she almost fell for the voice's influence.

Now Kyria was totally confused, things were not going well here at all. She raised her clawed arm and was going to say a few things to retaliate but then lowered it as she decided to keep quite for a bit. This was going to take a while to wrap her brain around. She sat herself down on the floor, lowered her head and growled to herself as she thought about what had happened to her so far; She had been nearly torn apart by vast curtains of energy, ensnared by purple tendrils and brought through unknown spaces to this place, captured by giant evil dust bunnies and brought before this ring, and finally this: Taunting childlike voices speaking as-one in her head that was being sent through the portal she had touched.

"No, that last bit isn't right" she thought to herself. The voices had called it a 'Gate' – not a portal. That implied it was not just a transport device but also possibly something to prevent entry. Or – an idea occurred to her – exit. Finally, she raised her head, morphed back to her human form and said, "Listen, I was brought here by _you!_ It wasn't my idea to be nearly killed six different ways while being shot through space warps and wormholes. I assume you saved me from being crispy fried at the start of this for a reason. If my being here is a puzzle to you, then what's the point of what you've done to me so far?"

The voices took on a cool even tone and stopped their childish taunts, "Very good! So you have spirit, pride, and at least when you are in human form, a fair amount of reason. Excellent. Of course we know _exactly_ why you were brought here. _You_ are the one that has to figure something out. Get it right and as your treat, your race will gain the power rule its galaxy. Get it wrong..." Kyria took great satisfaction in getting a chance to interrupt them for a change, "I know, I know. Get wrong and I die a horrible death by evil Dust Bunnies, blah blah blah."

The voices didn't change one bit and ignoring her jab continued on, "and you go free and another will be sought out. Even if it takes more aeon's we shall keep trying. We assume that releasing those who cannot assist us might, ah, encourage your superiors to send others to try. Do you think that we are wrong in this belief?" Kyria had to admit to herself that they probably weren't. "The rewards we offer your race are great. Now that the way has been shown, the Gate MUST be thrown open!"

Kyria eyes went wide in surprise and she stood up. "No matter what, I get to live? To get out of this place? No threats of ghastly death if I don't want to help you and just say I want to leave?" she cried out in amazement.

"Of course." the voices replied. "Can you think of a better way to encourage enough of your people to come here until we find someone who can trace the intricacies of the Lock that seals this Gate?"

Kyria had to admit it at least _sounded_ like a reasonable idea and if the voices were actually telling the truth she had nothing to lose. While she certainly wasn't about to blindly trust them to keep their word she still was intrigued "Alright. Can you make my ship space-worthy again?" The voices replied that they could not but – since her space suit and its systems were intact they could place her and the remains of her ship just outside of the influence of the artifacts shields where she would be quickly picked up by her people. "Alright, fair enough. You have a deal. What do you want me to do?"

**End of Chapter-8**

Finally the mid-point of the story! There is more coming folks, it just takes a while for the story to write itself in me head and leak out through the dimensions...

Cheers for now!

23


End file.
